Refit's First Quarter

First of all, this has absolutely nothing to do with April Fool's Day. Time is an artificial constuct anyway.

Peoplr who are familiar with the podcast Cortex will have heard of the idea of the yearly theme. After the unsual year that we all had, known as 2020, my theme is "The Year of the Refit".

A refit is an event where something like a ship or an airplane goes through an overhaul of sorts. Equipment is upgraded, repaired or removed due to being obsoleted. The process takes a long time, but when finished, the ship is nearly brand new. 

I have been offline since early January. My year of refit did not start as I planned, but it did start in the best way possible. Taking the time to rehabilitate my foot, my back and my mind has created the best set of conditions for the rest of the refit year to be successful. 

What I have learned from this is the importance of listening. Listening to those around me, listening to my body and listening to my mind. Listening to the doctor and the physical therapists helped me to fix my foot and back. Listening to my mind helped me to start working some long damaged mental stuff. The time off of the internet was part of the active process of listening. I had to get in better touch with reality. I had to make my world smaller.

I am not going to tell anyone what to do. I would recommend that you let your life tell you what to do. 

A refit takes a long time. I have heard of Aircraft Carriers taking up to 5 years for a proper refit. That is a refit involving experts in their fields and the proper equipment to complete their common goal. A personal refit is much the same. To be done properly, it cannot be rushed. Shortcuts do not lead to success. 

The Year of the Refit: End of Week 1

 This was one of those weeks where I am kind of glad that there are 52 in a year. The first 4 days of the new year were pretty strong. I put down 16.5 miles and filled up all of my rings on 3 of the 4 days (one day I was an hour short of my stand goal). The 5th was were the downfall began.

The 5th was my birthday and I didn't feel too bad about how that morning went. I didn't respond to my alarm as I should have and missed my window for running in the morning. While I wasn't bummed about getting a little older, I wasn't looking forward to the day. My depression has been pretty bad for a while and I was concerned about how I am feeling might get worse or become more visible to the people around me. Since I am relatively new on my job, it was a Tuesday, like any other day at work, which I was happy about. My wife had a minor surgical procedure that day as well. Overall, it lead to the mellow evening that I wanted.

The core problem has been with the rest of the week. I don't know what the deal was, but I had a few straight morning where my alarms on my phone and I were not seeing eye to screen. I am not sure how, but I managed to wake up in time to get to work. The end result was that I did not run, or fill my rings.

I have a couple of options in front of me at this point. I can beat myself up over not hitting my goals, or I can give myself some grace and get back to work. The first choice will be of no help, so number 2 it is.

So, here are this weeks numbers...

I am up 2 pounds from baseline. I think some of that is from my body getting confused with the changes after the holiday.

I ran 16.5 miles last week. That is what I have to build on.

I managed to hit my spiritual targets for the week. I feel like there is more that I can do.

I did not spend any time working on my programming plans this week. I did make head way in the books I am reading though, so can call that a small win. I also got some things taken care of on my action item lists. That hasn't been the case for a while. I hope I started to add some wrinkles to my brain this week.

The Year of the Refit

There is something visibly obvious when someone watches the classic TV show Star Trek and then watches Star Trek: The Motion Picture. In the movie, the USS Enterprise looks really different. The ship retained the same basic shape and the well known rooms are effectively in the same places, but the interior and exterior of the ship are all updated and upgraded to function better, faster, and more efficiently. In real life, aircraft and naval vessels undergo similar revisions and those are called refits.

USS Enterprise from the Original Series

USS Enterprise from the Movies
                                                                                  

I am not the sort of person who does New Years Resolutions. I never have been and I have written about that before. On the podcast, Cortex with Myke Hurley and CGP Grey, they talk about yearly themes. The difference between a resolution and a theme is a resolution is a specific set of actions, like go to the gym 4 times a week, or stopping smoking. A theme is a set of parameters that a person chooses to make their decisions based on. A theme around spending more time with family would use that as a factor in deciding what projects to take on or say "No" to. A person who has chosen a theme around learning new skills may choose to read a book instead of doom scrolling Twitter while standing in line at the pharmacy. Another difference between a theme and a resolution is that a theme can start and end whenever and can always be restarted. In the case of New Year resolutions, someone misses a day and then they feel justified in giving up. 

For myself, my theme this year is the year of the refit. 

Physical: The last couple of years have been really hard physically and mentally. I think that statement would be echoed by most people. My running speed, endurance and stamina have all gone down since I broke my toe and, even though I have recovered, my running mechanics have not returned to the previous form. While my speed has gone down, my weight has gone up. That is a factor in my running performance, but it is also a factor in my mental health. I have gained all of the weight back that I lost when I started running 5 years ago. Having to put clothes back on that used to fall off of me broke something in my brain. Also, my weight has an impact on how my medications work, so there is another avenue were my mental health has been effected. 

So in an effort to correct all of these numbers going in undesirable directions, I am going to take steps, in some cases literally, to close all of the rings on my Apple Watch. For those not informed on what that means, there are 3 rings on the Apple Watch displays that track 3 different indicators. The blue ring is for the number of hours in a day where you stood for at least one minute. The green ring tracks how many minutes you exercised and the red ring tracks how many calories were burned doing physical things, called active calories. It is not calculated the same way as a physician or dietician would do it, but closing those rings on a daily basis is an indicator of taking positive steps to living a healthy lifestyle. As for my settings, the goals I have are based on my activity for the past 3 years, since I collected data on an Apple Watch. My blue ring is set with a goal of 12 hours. That was the default setting for a long time. It is also the easiest of the three rings to closed daily. My green ring is set for 30 minutes of exercise per day. The red ring is set for 950 active calories. Other things that can be tracked are a target of seven hours of sleep and drinking a gallon of water per day. How the rings get closed is not the point. I can run, lift weights or practice yoga. The diversity of exercise will help to balance my training.

The other factor is behaviors that I will not do. I will not eat anything that could be purchased from a drive thru window. Another one is not eating after 8:00 pm. That is not just about reducing snacking, but I don't sleep as well when my stomach is full.

Intellectual: Another down spot for me in 2020 was being laid off for six months. While I am well educated and have of 20 years of experience at my day job, the competition for jobs has been really challenging. I needed to find ways to keep my problem solving skills sharp and learn some new things. I started to learn to write code, and I have been having fun with that. I am also going to put more non-fiction in to my reading routine. I read 14 books in 2020, but almost all of them were fiction. I am not dropping fiction completely, but I am aiming to read 12 non-fiction books this year. A mind is like any other muscle, it needs to be exercised, or it will atrophy. The books that I am planning to read are ones that I already have. More about that in another post.

Spiritual: It is well known that depression and anxiety are them Siamese twins of mental illness. One the areas that I have the hardest time with is finding ways and space to relax. I am going to make a greater effort to meditate. I have heard it said that a person needs to meditate for 10 minutes a day. If they don't have 10 minutes they need to mediate for an hour. My issue has been setting up daily triggers to make meditating top of mind for me. The hope is that with doing it daily, I can get better at it as well as create some peaceful space in my day. l am also going to continue to study Stoic Philosophy. I have found it helpful in keeping my focus and attention on things inside of my control and to set aside the rest. 

Under ordinary circumstances, there would be a social component to the refit, but a lot of that is outside of my control. Even though I am an introvert at heart, there is something missing in only seeing people on computer screen and reading their words instead of hearing their voices. I am going to work that in as the health of the world allows. 

Expected Results: The way I will be able to measure the effectiveness of the refit will be in the simple things. Weight reduction and 10k times reducing, VO2 Max data increasing are just a few indicators. Also, my flexibility will improve my current, monolithic, state. I will feel calmer and not as anxious or depressed. It is no substitution for being treated by professionals, but, it cannot hurt. I also derive some happiness in learning something new, so that will be a plus. Part of the way the theme works is in how all of the elements are interconnected. The theme addresses where I am and where I want to be in the next twelve months. The numbers are just the measure, not the goal in and of themselves. If I lose 20 pounds, as opposed to 40, that is OK. It is acceptable if I get through nine non-fiction books. Since the theme will a part of my routine doings, I expect that I will write about how it is progressing. 

I recognize that this is a really big theme. While all of the different elements are complicated in and of themselves, they are all interconnected. Physical activity helps with my mental state. The intellectual pursuits help to stimulate my mind as well as giving my mind something else to focus on, so that depression doesn't get a chance to take a foothold. The spiritual aspects work to clarify my thinking and to reduce my stress, which in turn, positively impacts my mental state. This will be a work in process, so I expect that there will be some slips. It is the _year_ of the refit, not day or week of the refit. I think that is an important thing for me to remember so I can more easily give myself grace. 

Some Heroes Wear Running Shoes

A few weeks ago, I was out on a run in my neighborhood and I came across one of the neighbors out on her walk. Even in the time of COVID, there are some of us who are able to go out on walks and runs while keeping reasonable distances from each other and wearing masks. In my stash of workout clothes, I have a lot of superhero related shirts. There is no leaning toward Marvel or DC, all of the shirt choices were based on fit. 

After a run, wearing the shirt.

As I happened upon the neighbor, she recognized me and asked if I was wearing a Captain America shirt the other day. I didn't recognize her at first, because she was by herself. After I confirmed what I wore on my run the other day, she told me that her son, who I would guess is about 4, recognizes me in the
neighborhood not by my height, but by that shirt. When I see the little boy out with Mom and the little sibling in the stroller, he is usually wearing something or somethings along the line of super heroes, so I can understand the connection in his mind. 

This family, who lives on an adjacent street, got me thinking about a couple of different things that in my mind are connected to the weight of these distanced interactions. First, runners are ambassadors to the community. Not just the people who see us huffing and puffing as we go down the road, but also people who are thinking of maybe taking up the sport. It is impossible to tell, but sight, if someone is lining up at the start of a race for the first time, or for the 150th time. Runners tend to be nice, supportive people. The race is not against the other runners, but against the course and against who the runner was. Runners are ambassadors or positivity, politeness and perseverance. The homeowners in the neighborhoods we run in either will see us as people who work hard for a goal, or who generate a lot of noise and a lot of garbage on our way past their houses. 

The connection of that child recognizing me by my shirt also is a reminder that everyone is a role model to someone else. The role model doesn't get to choose who admires them. Back in the 1990s, there was a Nike commercial campaign where Charles Barkley is not a role model.

While I understand where the commercial is coming from, Sir Charles has no say in who looks up to him. Being a role model is not something one is paid to do. They are also not a substitute for the role that parents should have in their kids lives. The rest of us are no different in that respect. Since role models can come from anywhere, it is not unreasonable for someone to be a role model and I have no idea that they are on that pedestal.

During a run, a trip to the store, or your time picking up your kids from school, a person can be admired at any time. It can also happen in the workplace. An intern or a new hire can see how you conduct yourself at work and make one of two decisions. Either you can be an example of what sort of coworker they want to be, or you can show them how they do not want to behave. 

On a run, when someone waves at you, smile and wave back. It doesn't throw off your pace or require you to even stop. Out in public or at work or school, be nice. I am not saying that a bad day or a bad mood isn't allowed, but, be mindful of how you react to things. Given the number of shirts I have from races, I don't pay much attention when I put one on. Even with nothing on me that flags me as a runner, you never know who you will run into in public. That potential is not limited to famous people. My wife and I have a joke between us that we can't go anywhere without me seeing someone I know. It isn't completely true, but does happen enough that it feels true.

When you think back to when you were younger, was there anyone that you looked up to? Did they know that was the case? Nature and nurture psychology says that the people we interact with have an impact on who we become. Jim Rohn said that you are the average of the 5 people you spend the most time with. When you consider all of these factors, what sort of impact do you want to have on society, even if you are not sure how?

151 Days In...

The 18th of May was last day on the job. It was a job that I had for less than a year, but, it was a job that I liked and, from what I understand, the people that I worked for liked my work and really didn't want to lay me off. I suspect that they didn't want to reduce their worldwide staff by 25%. Between COVID-19 and issues with one of the major players in the industry that I have worked in for the past 15 years, a perfect storm was created that has put me and a lot of other good scientists, engineers, and technicians back into the pool of perspective job candidates. 

This was not the first time that I have been part of a reduction in force. This time was different in that I was given just over 2 weeks notice. In my previous layoffs, I thought that I would have liked some sort of warning that a layoff was coming. The first time I was involved in this sort of a situation, I could tell by the amount of work that I had and what was going on in the company that the layoff was coming. While I started to take my personal items home about a week before the axe was officially dropped, I still had some hope that things would change. I had been there for five years and with my marriage was less than two years old, I was feeling stress in a way that was totally foreign to me. I was not only worried about how I was going to take care of my wife, but I knew a lot of people who were also out of work. There was a lot of competition for very few openings. I had wished that the people that I worked for had communicated better what the state of the business was and let people know what their short term futures were. 

Those wishes were fulfilled during the job loss that happened in May. I don't think the advanced warning made things better as I thought it would. While my wife and I were able to start cutting our expenses earlier, the work was harder. Since I was paid through my last day, I worked as hard as I could through that last day. It isn't in my nature to do otherwise. It was hard to forecast projects that I knew I would not see to completion. It was a challenge to be sure not to say too much to clients or suppliers. I was given no direction as to what I was allowed to talk about. The only real benefit was that I was able to hand off my projects and make the transition easier. Ultimately, the transition was made easier for my former employer, but I can feel like I did my best work until the end of my last day on the job.I did get a chance to talk to some of my clients and secure recommendations and references. I think that worked out better form me in that it demonstrated my professionalism to any future employer.

Ultimately, having your job end is not a pleasant experience in most cases. I don't think that having an explicit end date defined was the improvement on the situation that I thought it would be. The end result is the same and the next steps to be taken are the same. It is a better to pay attention to what is coming next that it is to dwell on the past. It is said that a waste of time keep looking back. That is not where you are going. There is a reason why it is called the road ahead.

So, That Wasn't the Outcome You Wanted...

We are living in a time of high unemployment and a pandemic. There have been wildfires on two continents. Our world has been fractured and divided in ways that have no historical precedent. With all of this stuff going on in the world, not only are there many people looking for work, but the way we job hunt has change a lot in the last year. Something that hasn't changed is the variables in the act of job hunting that are completely out of our control.

A universal part of job searching is the rejection component. I don't know of anyone who has received a job offer from every business that they applied to. There are more people looking for work than there are open positions. Even with these commonly known factors, being rejected for a job is hard. It is hard because you may be desperate to find work to support the family. It is hard because that job may represent a big move in your career. When you applied for the job, and when you were interviewed for the position, you may have thought that you are perfect for the role and that you could make a big impact on the business. When that rejection notice comes, it feels like the people you met with didn't see how perfect you are for the role. The rejection with no explanation and closure feels empty and presents a real opportunity for someone to feel down about themselves. The questions start to pile up with no answers to relieve them. While the chance to become disappointed and depressed about the situation has a lot of gravity to it, it is important to remember some helpful bits of reality.

1) All job searches are competitions. It is easy to forget that there are more people, besides you, applying for the same jobs that you are. Unlike other competitions, like sports or debate, you have no information about who you are competing with. Even though having that information would be completely useless, remembering that simple fact makes a big difference. The company that you applied to and interviewed with is looking for the best person that they think will fill the role. It is about making their business better, not about you feeling worse. There is nothing personal to it.

2) It is important to also remember that while you may apply to 5-10 jobs per week, the companies you are submitting to are hearing from a lot of other people going for a lot of positions. Reading and sorting through the resumes and cover letters takes along time. Stuff gets missed. A hiring manager may only spend a few seconds looking at a resume. Most of the time, reviewing resumes and job applications are not anyone's full time, all of the time job. Clearly, they are hiring because they recognize that they need help.

3) Just because you didn't get this job, does not mean that you are not unemployable. It is easy to fall into that hole of self-doubt. This disappointment is temporary. Keep looking and applying for the job that you want.

4) The inverse situation is just as important. You don't need to accept every job offer that comes. If you feel like that culture at the company may be toxic, or the commute is farther than you can stand, or you don't want to move to a new state, you don't have to accept the role. With all of that said, you may need to be careful how you do that. Sometimes, when a person is receiving unemployment, that may be required to accept any offer that comes. If that is the situation that you are in, it would be wise and proactive to withdraw from the position before that get to the offer phase. Remember you are evaluating the prospective employer as much as they are interviewing you. Otherwise, you might just be exchanging the misery of unemployment for the frustration of being in a job that you don't like.

I have been writing this from my own recent experiences. I have been writing this for myself as well as for anyone who could be helped by reading this. I am telling me and telling you to keep pushing. We are in a bad job market. There is a lot of competition out there and you have no idea if the people who got the jobs you didn't are better suited for the jobs than you are. It is a waste of time and resources to dwell on it. Focus on your strengths and talents. You are selling yourself in the act of job hunting. Put forward the best product that you can. 

Voice Lessons: No Escape

 I have been primarily using an iPad Pro for a little over a year. I went this route because my work horse 2011 MacBook Pro, while still working, is not working as well as it did when I first got it. For a while, while my MacBook was unavailable, I used an iPad Air 2 with a keyboard to get most things done. This experience really got me thinking about what the limitations of the iPad really are, versus the limits of my knowledge of how to use the device. 

Part of the decision to go with the iPad Pro over buying another MacBook (Pro or Air) had to do with how much I like to use iPad OS. While there was a stretch of time where it was necessary to figure out how to do my tasks with apps and the operating system, the experience caused me to develop an affinity with iPadOS. While some people complain about multitasking, I found it to be very useful and with some tweaks to my workflow, I was able to get it to work almost as I needed.

 Almost is where the story really begins. My current setup is a 2018 12.9 inch iPad Pro in a Smart Keyboard cover and the Apple Pencil. When I bought it, the plan was that this was going to be my daily driver. My computing needs primarily revolve around writing, email, household accounting, task management and social media. None of these functions require a ton of computing power. I don't write code or edit large audio or video projects, so it seemed like the iPad would be up to the missions that I have. For the most part, my tasks are nearly achievable with the iPad.

 I was able to adapt the stuff that I do to the new environment. In my day job though, I use Excel quite a bit. I have learned to do a lot of things with the software, in terms of analyzing data and looking for trends. Excel has been a key part of my work for over 15 years and it has become a comfortable tool for doing statistical analysis. When I tried to go with the iPad only lifestyle, I started using Numbers. It was because it came on the iPad and I was able to figure out how to make it fit into my workflow. I wrote some simple formulas for doing some basic spreadsheet work. As I worked on the templates and macros, I wanted to add more functionality and automation to the sheet. I quickly realized that there is some functions in Excel that is missing in Numbers, namely being able to do pivot tables with the data. A pivot table is a tool used to breakdown larger statistical data sets based on categories that the data falls into. I use them to evaluate how frequently certain things happen in my work. I also use them at home to break down the expenditures in my family's budget by category. Numbers kinda sorta break down the data, based on category, but there is still some manually math that has to happen to get to where a pivot table in Excel gets me. Why do math in a calculator from numbers on a spreadsheet? I installed Office 365 on my iPad and it bridged a lot more of the gap between what I needed to do and the limits of the iPad. However, it is still not possible in the MacOS version of Excel to create a pivot table. A previously created table can be refreshed, but a Mac or PC is required to build the initial pivot table. That was one problem that was beyond the iPad to solve.

Another thing that I was not able to do in MacOS was to use some of the functionality on some websites that I work in. Whenever I went to access those sites, the operating system keeps trying to push me to use the app version of the product. The apps have a lot of limitations when compared to the web version of the product. I needed to access the sites on a Mac or PC to use all of the functionality available. That was a second problem that was beyond the iPad's grasp.

Even though I don't write code, I do write formulas and equations for analyzing data sets. I have been doing this for a long time and have gotten in the habit of using the Escape key when I have made a mistake in my formula and need the algorithm to go away so I can start it over. The smart keyboard does not have an Escape key. I don't know of a keyboard made to go with the iPad that has an Escape key. I know that I could remap a key to give myself one, but, that would not solve the problem of muscle memory. Sometimes, I use the back-tick (`) and remapping that key just changes the name of my problem instead of solving it. I remember when Apple released the first Touch Bar MacBook Pro models and developers talked about the lack of a physical Escape key and I could relate the the concern.

For as much as I wanted my iPad Pro to be my only computer, I find myself in that space where it was not going to solve all of my computing needs. Also, it created some artificial limits

around developing future skills. There have been more than a few occasions where I have thought of teaching myself how to write code. As a result, I bought a 2020 MacBook Air. The scissor switch problems on Apple laptops that people were reporting was part of my reason with trying to go iPad only. I was determined to wait through the era of the scissor switch keyboards before I considered buying a new Mac. While the 16 inch MacBook Pro came out earlier this year, it is way more computer than I need or could afford. My daughter told me that she likes my computer. "It is cute and small," she said. Ironic considering I think my wife's 17 inch laptop is huge. Generally speaking, I am not a fan of bigger laptops. If I need something that big, I wouldn't haul it around much, so an iMac would do the job.

As far as the MacBook Air goes, I freaking love this thing. Even for being a consumer grade computer, it out performs my old MacBook Pro. Considering that the Air it is almost 10 years newer, it should out run my MacBook Pro. I also love not having to deal with the response times of spinning hard drives. The 13 inch MacBook Pro was announced the Monday after I ordered the Air. If I edited video in 4K, or wrote code professionally, I would have cancelled my Air order and gone with the new 13 inch MacBook Pro. The thought that Apple would start making computers with ARM chipsets, instead of Intel, was not something I had considered a near term possibly.  The Air not only meets my short term needs, but I think I will be able to use it for many years to come.  I did the migration of my data from the old machine overnight and it took about 5 hours. I am glad that I slept through that. So far, in the time that I have had it, I have not had any trouble with the Air. I love how the keyboard feels as I type and there is a physical Esc key. It feels like things are in order. While some people have talked about problems with thermal performance, I have not experienced any of those issues. I also don't try to use my MacBook like a gaming PC. Another plus to the Air, versus my old MacBook Pro is that I can reliably do video calls on it. With job interviews being done on Zoom, Google Meet, or Skype, The MacBook Air has been able to handle it. I am not sure that my MacBook Pro could have. Even with the 720p camera, I have been clear on camera and the people I have been meeting with have been able to hear me with no issues.

 Where does this leave me, in terms of my iPad? I still use it every day and it accomplishes a lot of my basic tasks. The workflows that I developed for performing tasks on the iPad are still faster to do than on my MacBook, so I still gravitate to it for those actions. I am also using it for things, like email, that I do in the evening while watching TV with the family. I am also using the MacBook on a daily basis. It has been perfect for doing things, like job hunting, where some of the websites do not allow the use of a phone or tablet. I am also using it to do things like building more complicated spreadsheets and teaching myself how to code. Mostly the computer that is in front of me is the computer that I can get things done with. 

The 5 Hour What?

 I recently experienced a job interview that lasted 5 hours. It sounds weird at first pass, but, given how COVID has changed so much about how the working world operates, it makes sense. Between social distancing and extra steps around mask wearing and the sanitizing of hands, businesses are having to figure out different ways of identifying and recruiting new talent. Even something as simple as a handshake is now only referred to in nostalgic remembrance. 

During the time that I have spent looking for new work, I have had a job interviews take some new and interesting forms. Phone screens are about the same as they were before the shelter in place way of life  I have had onsite interviews where there were modifications to the conference room to partition spaces for individuals to be seen through plexiglass during panel interviews. I have had socially distant interviews where there has been several empty seats in between participants. The most interesting twist on the panel interview I have experienced was a virtual interview that took five hours. It sounds intimidating and really arduous, but I found the experience to be very pleasant.

The interview was broken up into half hour increments and I met with people in different areas of the business that I would potentially be working with and people who current have the role that I am applying for. Even though I talked to ten people, it was not as stressful or pressure loaded like a traditional panel interview can be. The questions were more handled in a more conversation way and it made the whole process more organic. I think that I did better being interviewed in this format. It was more relaxed and even though I saw that same sorts of questions being asked, I was able to answer based on who was asking. From the side of the people doing the interviewing for the company, sometimes instead of listening to the answers to questions asked by others on the panel, they focus on the question they are waiting to ask. From the perspective of the person being interviewed, it can feel like a board of inquiry.

Even though it seems like a huge amount of time, the people who were conducting the interviews were only committed to a 30 minute intervals, so their working day was not horribly interrupted, and in talking to people from different elements of the business, I got a very good sense of what the culture is like. I can also make some different, informed decisions about if the company feels like a good fit for me. Considering that job interviews should be just as much about the candidate evaluating the company as it is about the business evaluating the applicant.

Since I think that the process of interviewing for jobs is heading toward this direction, here are some tips for getting yourself and your space ready for a remote interview.

1) Make the space your are interviewing in as comfortable and visually appealing for the camera.

I am not talking about cleaning up the whole space, but think about what the person on the other side of the camera. Keep it simple, clean and uncluttered. You don't want the person you are talking to pay more attention to what is behind you than what you have to say.

2) Test your camera set up before the interview.

Remember that you are trying to make a good impression to the person you are interviewing with. Technical problems will get the interview off on the wrong foot. 

It is not just if the camera or the internet work, but test what the other person will see. Most of us don't have a video studio we can interview from. Make sure the lighting is brighter on you than it is behind you. You don't want to look like a silhouette or have shadows obscuring half of your face. In my case, I have a window behind me when I am sitting at my desk. I closed the curtains behind me and I have an LED ring light that I clipped to the other side of the desk to make sure that the right amount of light is in the right places. It is also a good idea to check to see how well your microphone works. This will tell you if you need to use a different microphone than the one that is built into your computer. It makes sense. You want to make sure that the person on the other side of the internet can hear you. 

3) Dress as though you are meeting in person.

The adage is to dress for the job you want. Virtue interviews are not an exception to that rule. Not only does the visible part of you have an impact on the impression that you make, it also gets you in the right mindset for the interview. Some might think that they could get away with a dress shirt, tie and pajama bottoms. I would not recommend that. The frame of mind is a lot more important and, you can tell if someone is wearing the proper pants on camera.

4) Eat before and have water with you

It seems obvious, but being at home can cause some behavior patterns that are really different from the life of being in public. Sleep schedule and eating routines are usually the first to go. A light, protein loaded breakfast will help you stay focused during the interview and prevent audible stomach growling. Even if it isn't picked up on the microphone, it can distract you as you are talking. 

Having water with you in the room is a good idea. It is totally acceptable to sip water during the conversation and water will not leave visible stains like coffee might. I recommend a container with a lid. You want to drink the water, but the computer does not. This is especially important if the interview is booked for longer than an hour. Just because you have the water does not mean that you have to drink it all before the end of the interview. A bathroom break in the middle of the interview could leave a negative impression.

While the methods and use of technology may be changing how job interviews are conducted, the end goals are really the same as they ever have been. The perspective employee and the business are interviewing each other to see if working there is a good fit for both parties. Doing it over the internet is not any easier or harder than doing it in person, only different. The need for preparation and professionalism on both sides are unchanged. This is just another adaptation to how the world has changed.

Podcast Overload

It is the start of 2019 and a lot of people talk about resolutions. As I have written before, I am not one of those people. I think that everyone has the opportunity to change things about their life whenever they choose to. That having been said, when someone has a long term, say a year long, project, starting on 1 January is a good benchmark for measuring the progress over the course of a year.
Most people who know me in the walking around world know that I like podcasts. I like them a lot. I listen to topics ranging from technology, to space, to running to movies and other sorts of stuff. The term problem would be a strong one, so I will say issue instead. The issue is that I have quite a backlog of podcasts. 711 podcasts as of the morning of January 1.

Screen shot from my Overcast app.

That represents about 33.2 GB of space, or half the total capacity of my iPad Air 2. Some of the files go back as far as 2016.
Some people talk about declaring podcast bankruptcy, which is the simple act of clearing out some or the entire podcast queue and starting over. I really don't want to do that. Some of the files are for podcasts that have completed their run of shows, such as Canvas. I want to finish that run of show out and that act will help to reduce some of the total shows and memory space used. There are other shows, that I will stop after I finish a particular run of shows, such as The Horror Aisle, where my brother was one of the hosts. I want to finish out his run on the show.
The other thing is that it seems like I hear about new podcasts that I want to start listening to all of the time. One show in particular, Friends in Your Ears, seems to always suggest one or two new shows to try out. When people ask me how I find out about new shows, I always recommend that one as a place to start.
As for my strategy to get caught up on Podcasts in 2019, the first is to  keep current on the ones that I am listening to now. I am adjusting one of Dave Ramsey's baby steps for getting out of debt by getting caught up and staying current on shows, like one might get caught up on past due bills and stay current on those moving forward.
The second step is to work on completing the podcast runs of shows that have ended, or I know where my finishing point is. Then, the last pieces is to simply listen to a couple more shows than I download. Some shows are super short, while others are anywhere from 90 minutes to the occasional 3 hour show. Let's see how this goes.
As far as this project goes, my plan is to update my progress here on a weekly basis. It will not be the only thing that I write about, but it will be a recurring topic as 2019 goes. I will mention when a show ends, I get caught up, or when start a new one in a moment of weakness. This should be a fun experiment.

Voice Lessons

I have been seeking advice from a lot of people with regards to blogging. Specifically, how do you know what to write about. The consistent response that I get, to boil it down to a common thread, is to "find my voice." 

Finding my voice, basically, is to figure out what sort of topics I want to write about. This has been a hard thing for me to do. I have a dozen bits and pieces of blog posts written, on topics ranging from home ownership, to foster parenting, to training for a marathon. It is surprising how much of the Venn diagram of foster parenting and marathoning overlap. Pieces and parts of posts, but nothing yet that I feel like is worthy of posting. 

Something about the act of "finding my voice" that is very free feeling is that I can write about anything I want. Freeing and at the same time, a bit terrifying. It could be that the reason why I have an iPad with a pile of blog bits in front of me is that there is a part of me that feels like that I am not good enough to write something that is fit for others to read. When I look at the posts that I read and the podcasts I listen to or the videos that I watch as I eat breakfast in the morning, I often think to myself that these people are pretty talented to be able to put out stuff like this on a consistent basis. I look at that and I feel like I don't have what it takes to publish blog on at least a weekly basis.  It is a feeling that I am not alone in having. Feeling inadequate to be published has been talked about by a lot of well respected people in their fields. The term that commonly gets used is imposter syndrome. It is a feeling that has been felt by doctors, writers, actors, artists, musicians. Interestingly enough, it even gets talked about by world leaders in their biographies and obituaries. Even with the feelings of fear of negative criticism, sounding or looking foolish, or just being rejected by those who they hold in high esteem, these people of found the courage in themselves to just say it anyway.

Voice Lessons has been created to provide a chance for me to find my voice for my writing. No theme, no particular topics of expertise.  Someone who doesn't try to talk doesn't learn how. It will also give me a repeating opportunity, in the short term, to be be brave about what I have to say and put it out in the world. Voice Lessons are going to only have the common thread in that the topics are just stuff that I wanted to write about in the moment. What will the end result of this? I have no idea. A result that I am hoping to find is that I will develop the belief in myself to publish what is in my head and my heart, even of no one likes what I write, or if no one even reads it. 

The reason I write is not to be famous, or well regarded. I am fairly sure that I will not get rich doing it. There are really two reasons for me. I get the chance to maybe teach someone something new to them or encourage them to be daring. I hope to encourage someone to try something new. Everyone's life is a story, of sorts. I think that sometimes people go through troubles so that in the future, they have the opportunity to use the problems of their past to help others around them. Sometime, when situations feel dire, it helps to hear from someone who has been in that experience that it gets better. The other reason is admittedly more selfish. I write so that the words and thoughts that are in my head can get out. Words that feel like they will poison me if I keep them in for too long. Writing is something that I have always liked to do. It could be that the fear of not being good enough is part of what kept me from really trying to do it more seriously.  

This post is the first of I hope many. From the outside, it will appear to be totally random. If someone decides to read this one, and whatever comes out of my fingers after this, they will go on a journey with me to see what becomes of my voice. What sort of a writer will I become? It will be a lot of fun finding out together.

This Week in Running (February 5th to 11th)

This was a great week for me to get back on track on my running goals as I prepare for the marathon at the end of April. Considering that I have not been as consistent with my posting, it may be hard to tell that I have a marathon coming up.

January was not the training month that I wanted to have, but, who really wants to spend half of a month sick. I got hit with the flu that has been impacting a lot of people all over the country. Considering how many people have ended up in the hospital, or worse, I think I got off easy. This is especially important since everyone else in my family have a higher chance of getting sick than I do and none of them caught it. Something to be said for hand sanitizer and using a Neti pot to making this go away. I did have to take a trip to urgent care to get a high powered cough suppressant, so that I could sleep with out waking myself, or my wife up. Now, I am on to February and feeling up to getting back on track. For the sake of brevity, I have been training for the Marathon using the Nike Running Club app with a marathon training program built in. I tell it when my race is and it sets a plan for it. The plan is adjusted based on how well I run over the course of the week as well as how I do on benchmark drills that are spaced out over the weeks.

Screen shot from my phone. This is how many
shows I had to listen to as of Jan. 29th.

Monday, February 5th. I ran 5.75 miles this morning with a time of 57:49. That puts my pace at about 10’03”. Not too bad for recovering from rebelling lungs. It was nice to run in my usual places and see how things have changed. In particular, there is a part of my route where there is some new houses being built and that have gone up so fast since I have been down. It will be nice when the street lights in that area are up and working, so I don’t have such a dark spot in my route. Typically, I run while listening to podcasts. Considering how many podcasts I have in my queue, you would think that I don’t listen as often as I do. Thing is that I am working through a backlog of shows going back to 2016. I have gone through and purge out the shows that have lost my interest, or episodes that are very event focused. So, what is left is still subjects that I want to hear more about. On this run, I listened to the most recent episodes of MacStories and Twenty Thousand Hertz. It made the time pass quickly. It was good to get my feet moving again too.

Tuesday, February 6th. This day had one of my most challenging drills to date. The schedule called for a 6 X 1000 meter speed drill. B as I call, I had to run 1000 meters as fast as I could, pause for about 90 seconds, than do it over again until I ran it 6 times. So, I ran full our for 6 kilometers (3.72 miles) over a time of 33:35. That is an average pace of 8’54”. My time on my fastest kilometer was my second interval, with a time of 8’06”. On this morning, I had Cortex playing during the run. I listened to a pretty good piece of the episode by the time I finished the drill. I was completely worn out.

Wednesday, February 7th. This was an indoor training day. I have been using the Nike Training Club app for my Cross Training work. The routine for this session is called Back It Down. I have been running consistently for about 3 years, but, I have basically ignored my core and upper body strength and I can really feel it whenever I do one of these workouts. It only took a little over 24 minutes to make me sweat like it is summer time. All of it was focused on upper body and core strength as well as balance. I listened to music on my iPhone during this since there is a lot of talking during each part of the workout.

Thursday, February 8th. This was a benchmark day. About every couple of weeks or so, the Nike Running Club app has me run a 7 minute warm up, followed by an all out sprint for 3 minutes and a 5 minute cool down. I have done a few of these before, but, this was the first one I have done in a while where I wasn’t sick or it wasn’t freezing outside. I also run these with music on since this is a guided drill with a lot of talking. I covered a total distance of 1.63 miles with a 9’18” average pace.

Friday, February 9th. This was a big day. A problem I have had with my training, even before I got sick was I had a tendency to skip my long runs on the weekends. Between being tired from the long week as well as getting up with my youngest to that my wife can catch up on her sleep, it was my training that suffered. I decided to let the schedule decide when my long runs would happen instead of moving it to the weekend and letting it not happen. Friday was the day for the long run, so I let it be. I got up at 3 am instead of my usual 4 and got out there. I ran 12.5 miles in a time of 2:09:08. That is an average pace of 10’20”. It was great get that short term goal done. During this run, I listened to the Accidental Tech Podcast and Do By Friday. Two very different shows, but they both kept my spirits up as I covered the distance. 

Art from the Nike Running Club app recording my run
on Friday. I felt rabbit fast that day.

I felt really good getting those accomplishments done for the week and I feel like this marathon coming up is not impossible. I even hope to improve on my time from last year.

2018 (That is going to take a bit to get used to.)

We are at the beginning of a new year and it is a time of renewal. It is a time where people set new goals for the year. Some people’s goal come in the form of resolutions to do things like work out more or eat less. I am not the sort that waits for New Year’s Day to make changes, so resolutions are not part of my normal vocabulary. If I want to change some thing, I just start making the changes. I plan on talking about goal setting soon, but today is not the day for that.

My Best Nine from 2017 according to Instagram

2017 was a really difficult year in a lot of respects. We had a house fire in early March. While the actual fire damage was fairly minor, due to my wife’s very quick thinking, There was several thousands of dollars in damage as well as the time my family was displaced from the home. No one was injured in the fire, but, it did put the family in a bit of a tailspin until we all returned home a few months later. 

About a month after the fire, I competed in my first full Marathon. I picked one that was close to home, but at the time of the race, we were living in a hotel about 25 miles from where we live, so I had to drive a farther distance to the race than planned. That was not the only “home field advantage” that I lost or forfeited. I have lived in my town for over 10 years. I knew that the area where the race is held is windy all of the time. I did not take that into account when I picked what I was going to wear during the race. As a result, I froze over the whole course, wearing only a t-shirt and shorts. I would have benefitted well from a long sleeve shirt if nothing else. I ended up finishing the race with a time of 5:12:47. Not a bad time at all for my first marathon, but I will have to admit that I was disappointed with my time, initially. I had it in my head that I could estimate my time based on the times I have had during my half marathons. That could not be farther from the truth. Running a marathon is a lot more than double the physical requirements of a half marathon. There is a sizable mental aspect to the event. I learned about myself as well as how to prepare for a marathon. When I finished, I thought a lot about if I would do another one. In time, I decided that I would and that is part of what I will be talking about in the weeks ahead.

As far as my running for this year, I ran a total of 1,036 miles over the course of the year. Not bad, but I do plan to go farther this year. I am also planning on working more on my upper body strength. I think that will go a long way toward helping me improve on my overall race performance. I will be writing about that as well.

While 2017 was not the year that I wanted, it does not define what 2018 will be. I would like this to be encouraging to whom ever read it. Another project that I am doing this year is posting a picture a day on Instagram. If you are interested in seeing what I post the, please follow me @1pairofshoes. That is my handle on Twitter as well, but, I kind of just post wha comes to mind there as well as retweet the things that I find interesting. Beware!! Happy New Year!!

My iPad Experiment

My iPad Air 2 along side with my old school iPad.

I have been hearing a lot about the idea of using an iPad as a replacement for a laptop. From what i have heard and read, there seems like there is a split between camps as far as those who believe that the iPad is a tool for creating content and those who think it is a toy for consuming stuff on the internet. Even as I wrote this, I found myself writing in terms of using a computer versus using an iPad. It occurred to me that this made it seem like I had a bias coming into this experiment.  So, why am I doing this? I want to see what the true limits are for this technology at this point and how I can work with it. Just like trying to learn a new language, something that I have some experience with, I think that the best way to learn something new is through immersion. So, for the month of July, I didn't touch my MacBook Pro and instead, I did everything I normally do over the course of a month using only iOS. There are a couple of exceptions to mention up front. I do have a Windows machine at my day job that I am required to use. The combination of some specific software that I have to use and the restrictions that the company that I work for has pertaining to using personal devices on the company network prevented me from extending this project further. I haven't used my work computer at home and I have only used it for work tasks. Ironically enough, my work computer weighs more than my MacBook does, so I really don’t feel motivated to take it home under normal conditions unless I have to. 

Hardware:

I listen to a lot of podcasts. I listen to a lot of podcasts about tech stuff. I listen to a lot of podcasts about Apple tech stuff. Generally, they all have been referring to things in terms of the iPad Pro. The information that they share is great, however, I do not have the latest and greatest in iPads. I would like one at some point, but I cannot cost justify replacing my iPad that is working great for one that would work faster and possibly could  do some more stuff. When I listen to the podcasts, I find myself experimenting around the subject that are talking about to see if my iPad is up to the task. For this experiment, I have been rocking an iPad Air 2, an iPad mini, 4th generation (the first with the Retina display) and an iPhone 7. It could be said that I am living the MultiPad lifestyle, frugal edition. I am only using the software keyboard on the devices. They all have cases, but there sole purpose is to protect them from drops, smacks and my kids. The only reason that I am using the most current iPhone is because it was recently replaced after my  iPhone 6s was damaged in a house fire. 

My MacBook, with another project in progress from a few months ago.

In contrast to what I use that runs iOS, my MacBook Pro is a 13 inch, late 2011. It is from before the retina display was introduced to the line up, so, the screen resolution is not like what my iPhone or my iPads display. Part of the reason why I wanted to try this is that my MacBook is 6 years old and I can envision a day when it will not run the latest version of MacOS. As far as I know, it will run High Sierra when it comes out, but I can see how more of the resources get used up on the most basic of tasks, with each OS update. When I get to that point, I will need to look at what I can seriously afford in comparison to what my real needs are in a computer. 

One thing to bring up on the software side of things, I am running iOS 10.3.3. This is important to keep in mind as I am talking about the tests over the month of July. I don't have a need in my professional life to get a beta account with Apple, so what I use is what is available to anyone out there. With iOS 11 likely coming out in the next few weeks, there are a lot of things that I will talk about here that will probably not be consistent with how iOS 11 will work. I have not see iOS 11, in person, yet, so it is important that I am only writing this from an iOS 10 frame of reference. 

Preplanning:

I knew heading into this project, I would need to think a lot about how I do things that I do on the Mac and make that translate to do it on the iPad. I did add a couple of apps to get me going and make my transition a little easier. I didn't add anything that I would not have under other circumstances, but, this was a push I needed to make the additions. One app I added was 1password. I needed a password manager and this is one one I have been hearing the most about. However, I did not give myself enough time to fully implement 1password, so I had to refer to my old, less secure, methodology. I did get it set up on all of my devices. I also looked to see if my bank had an updated app. They have one, but it is clunky and not terribly helpful. There are a couple of things that I need to contact my financial institution about. Besides the state of their app, I would like to know when, or if they will get Apple Pay. There were some additional apps that I could have bought to make my iPad configuration close to my MacBook. I could have bought an Office 365 subscription, but, I really don't use Word or Excel that much at home, unless I am doing a work project. That is a purchase that I will likely make in the future, but I determined that it was not mission critical for this experiment.

Initial impressions:

At first, I really had to force myself not to go to my MacBook as the month started. It has been my go to place to do this kind of work for several years. That urge only lasted for a couple of days. It was easier to go the iPad to do stuff after I turned the MacBook completely off. I have had my iPads for a while, so I knew how they worked, up to a point. It was really easy to get a rhythm and a process down for doing things, like balancing my bank account, or writing in my journal. Since everything is connected to iCloud or Dropbox, getting at my information was easy. Hardest part was getting used to the software keyboard on the iPad. I have pretty large hands and I learned how to touch type in school. Even working in landscape mode was difficult while typing on the iPad glass. I got used to it in time, but, I do plan on getting a keyboard cover for my iPad. 

What I really liked:

The first thing that really jumped out was that things loaded so fast. Once I got multitasking down, which was no small feat, I was able to use that for a lot of my stuff. I did not put Workflow on my iPad on purpose. I am not opposed to it, but, I didn't want to try to teach myself how to use it during this experiment. Something else I did was start to expand my use of Pages. I have it on my devices, but, my career path has always put me in front of Word and Excel. As I said earlier, I could have put Office 365 on my iPad, but, I really didn’t know how much I would need to access the documents that I have already written. New stuff that I wrote at home, wrote using Pages. As I used it more,I actually came to like how much simpler Pages is to use. I may end up sticking with it after the experiment is up. Even as I have been preparing this blog article to post, I have been learning some things about using Pages on the Mac that I would not have if I had not done this experiment. I still have a lot of learning to do to get Numbers down as well as I understand Excel, but I will get there. There wasn’t any need for spreadsheet work over July, I that was a part of the immersion process that I needed to get into.  

The biggest thing I stumbled across doing this experiment is that if pushed me to use my iPad in ways that I had not learned without the necessity. Initially, I didn't use my iPad in landscape mode nearly as much as I should have. Things like using the iPad in split screen mode did not seem to work as well as I would have thought after hearing about it as much as I have over the past several months. At one point in the month, I started to think that somehow, split screen was limited to the iPad Pro and I had just missed that fact for all of this time. Turns out, I just need to figure it out. While it doesn't work on everything, I have learned which apps I have that will do the true split screen and which ones do the 1/4 split. As my knowledge of what the limits of each of these apps is, the more flexibility I am finding in using the iPad as a replacement for my MacBook.

Something else that I really liked is something that didn't really jump out at me as I started to write this is the fact that my power supply for my iPhone and my iPad was one and the same. Packing around my iPad is easier than my MacBook, which was completely expected. But, I did not consider that I would need to take less around with me in my bag. As far as cables in my backpack goes, I have one iPad power block,  one lightning cable, a short USB to MicroUSB, for charging my headphones or my block speaker, and the proprietary cable for charging my Fitbit. I would like to reduce my cable count to reduce further, but that is something that will come over time. 

What bothered me about it:

One of the things that some of the apps that I needed to use was not available in split screen at all. That is not necessarily a fault of Apple’s, but, I think that using only the onboard keyboard prevented me from switching apps as easily as I do on my MacBook. I will need do some additional research to see if there is a website that lists which apps work in true split screen, 1/4 screen or not at all. 

Also, I have big hands and, while I have one of the smaller MacBook Pro models available on the market, trying to touch type on the iPad keyboard was a bigger challenge than I would have liked. When I start looking seriously at keyboard covers, I will need to visit some at the store before I purchase one. I have also noticed that I really started to fill up my iPad as I worked on this experiment. I have added about 10 new apps to my iPad and, even with iCloud and Dropbox in use, I am down to about 10 GB available on my 64 GB iPad. I will take a serious look at which apps I have on there that I really need. 

End results:

After the experiment, I have determined that I could use my iPad, which is the make and model that some people would describe as the one for “consumption” as a replacement for my MacBook. There are some things I need to do, mostly in the form of changing my personal workflows for completing tasks, but that is something that I am confident I can do through experimentation. It was not a seamless transition from one to the other, but I don't think that would have been a realistic expectation. I need to consider that I did not preplan enough. 

What is next?

At some point in the future,I will try this again. It will, most likely, be on the same iPad, but, there will be some changes to my process before I begin. On the hardware side, I will need to get a  new case with a built in keyboard. I have been doing some research in to this and they are getting harder to find since the iPad Air 2 model was discontinued. My field trip to the store will have to happen sooner than later. The other thing that will change is that I will probably not involve my iPad mini in the next test. While it was my first iPad and I still use it, the 16 GB of memory makes it really limited as far as what I can do with it. On the software side, iOS 11 will be out before I do this and I will spend some time in advance getting familiar with that before I take another stab at it. I am sure that it will be successful, but I am interested to see if it will be easier than the month of July went. As far as when I may repeat the experiment, I think that I will spend a couple of months working with iOS 11. I will not completely cut myself off from using my MacBook, but, I am going to look at things from the vantage point of teaching myself as I go.

Deciding Between Digital and Paper Notebooks

This may end up just being a scary look at how I make decisions. Since I am writing this around Halloween season, I guess this could be considered a scary story. If you read this to the kids, and they, in turn, have nightmares, I take zero responsibility.

I have a day job where there is a huge part of the job where taking notes is an important thing. There are a bunch of meetings, many of them more time wasters than product makers, but there are nuggets of important information that can leak out of these meetings. There are also bits of information that present themselves accidentally at times. 

There dilemma that I find myself stewing over is what, from a tools stand point, do I use to take notes. I have read and really like Mike Vardy’s idea of “The approach is more important than the app.” I don’t think that is my problem. I have a pretty solid method of identifying quickly what information to write down and what to let fly by, but, I have a bit of hang up about what to write in. 

This is the issue of collecting the information digitally, such as an app on my phone or my tablet, or writing things down, by hand in a physically notebook with paper. I am not making a decision as to what to buy, i already have all of the tools in place to do both, i think I am trying to settle on a process and stick to it.

What I have been doing most recently has been to carry my iPad to every meeting that I go to, open Evernote, set up that note so that I have documented what the meeting is and when it is. After that, I sit, listen intently, and wait for that nugget of data to drop before I can type it into my iPad. Often times, there is no nugget to fall. When that happens, I digitally recycle my note with a new date, and or topic and continue. 

The benefits of this process is that I can write what is happening and it is easily read later when I have act on something. Anyone who has had the challenge of reading my own handwriting can testify that it is a big challenge. My parents thought I was going to be a physician based on my handwriting. I guess engineers don’t have great, artsy script either.

Also, I have lost bits of paper from time to time, but, the only time I have lost my computer is when my house got broken into. Since the notes that I write are ported to a cloud based software, I can open them on pretty much any computer with an internet connection. 

The internet connection is possibly one of the drawbacks. In my case, my personal devices, i.e., my phone, my iPad, or my personal computer, if I took it to work, are not allowed on the work network. As such, any notes that I take on my iPad will not be saved until I get my iPad on a wireless connection. This means that I have to wait until I get home before I can save the notes. With that, there is some risk. The iPad could be stolen, or broken, or some other cataclysmic event could make my notes go bye-bye. 

The other method that I have used in the past is to carry a physical notebook with where ever I go. I can stop, whip out the notebook and write down whatever information that I need to. I doesn’t matter if I have an internet connection, or not. I don’t run the risk of my paper notebook running out of batteries, and, if my pen, which is a favorite, gets lost, I can feel pretty confident that I can find one to use to write down what I need to write down.

The downside to the paper notebook is the whole crappy handwriting thing I talked about earlier. The other thing about the paper notebook that could be problematic is the possibility of losing it. I have been working hard toward only having the things that I need and use in my life, so, the minimization of clutter helps promote finding my stuff when I need it. I have a bag that I keep my critical gear in, an my notebook is in that bag. Then again, my iPad is in that bag, unless I am using it or charging it.

I could minimize the damage caused by losing a notebook by typing my notes from the day into Evernote and use that to make the notes searchable and recoverable. It is also a good Idea for me to review my notes when I have the best chance to be able to read what I wrote down and turn it into something useful. I also will give myself the best chance for my action items to actually make it into my task management system. 

So, it sounds like I might have a plan. Let’s see how this goes. I would like to know what you use and how that works. Please leave me some notes in the comments.

Retread-Why do I run anyway?

After the finish of the 2016 North County Wine Run Half Marathon.

As I write this, I am recovering from running in the North County Wine Run. The race was a half marathon and this is the third half marathon I have completed since June. As I have been thinking about writing, in general, and restarting this blog again in particular, I don't think I have written much about my adventures in running. No secrets, and admittedly, I haven't written much about anything, but I just haven't really talked about it.
About two years ago, I had the experience of having to start wearing size 40 pants. That event really messed with my head for a long time. I think that it shattered my sphere of deniability. I was truly more than chubby. I was fat. I was a dangerous kind of fat. It wasn't until about 6 months later that I actually started to do something about it.
Toward the end of June 2016, I got on the scale and it said that I weighed almost 300 pounds. There are some people in this world were that weight is expected. They are NFL linemen and centers in the NBA. Since I am about 6'2" and my day job is as an engineer, so I don't think that I can tell the truth by saying that 300 pounds was a healthy weight for me. If you have ever heard Dave Ramsey talk on his show, or in his books about the "I've had it!!!!" moment, than you can understand what I was feeling. He talks about it in the frame of reference of getting out of debt, but, for me, it was in terms of my weight. I had that moment in my mind when I screamed, to myself, "I'VE HAD IT!!!!!!" I knew that I had to do something, but I had to come up with something where my chances of finding a reason to give up was small.
I live in a really small community of less than 10000 people. We do have a couple of grocery stores, a post office and more than one stop light, but, it isn't like Portland, or where I grew up. As a consequence of this, there was no gym here. I like to lift weights and do other kinds of exercising like that. I quickly realized that the only real think I could do, for exercise, was run. I have a treadmill, which works perfectly fine, but, my foot strikes are kind of loud and I really didn't want to wake up the whole house with an early morning run on the treadmill.
I figured that the only thing I had really any control of was my schedule, so I started to get up early so that I could start to walk/run before work. Early is an interesting thing, because, it means different things to different people.

My early is 4am.

This is the time of day when rock stars start thinking about going to sleep and I get up that early. I really haven't had any trouble getting up that early. This is the time of day that works for me to run. Mt family is asleep, so I am not taking any time away from them. Also, there are very few people out, so nearly no cars on the road and I don't see many people outside. Running in the dark is not something that scares me, but, people my size don't get jumped often, unless it is by a mob. My experience has actually been the reverse. I have sensed a feeling of peacefulness this time of morning. It is just me, the road, and whatever podcast is playing in my ears.

Fast forward to today. As the titular question asks, why do I run? The physical reason is that it is how I like to exercise. I am about 60 pounds lighter as a result of running and changing what I am eating. There has been a social component to the experience. I have met people at races and started talking to people in running groups all over the country. There is a competitive aspect to it as well. The other night, my wife gave me a bit of a hard time calling the half marathon a race as opposed to a run. Yes, there is a price for first place, but, I see it as my racing against a former version of me. A slower version of me. A heavier version of me. I finished with a time of 1:57:35, which is my third personal record in 3 races this year. I get faster with each race. I also wanted to finish in under 2 hours today, so I am really happy with my performance. There are different kinds of results that can be looked at. During those times when my weight plateaus, I can see the gains in my time improving.

This journey is not over by any means. I am not the weight I want to be yet. I am not as fast as I want to be yet. I want to run longer races. I am still a work in progress. I don't think anyone is completely finished until the end. I am just being really intentional about who I want to become.

Penanoid

Sometimes, people get possessive over stuff. I am not talking about greediness or envy, or anything that would fall into the "seven deadly" category. It's like when a kid gets a new toy for Christmas, or when a person gets a new car and won't even let their significant other drive it.

I admit that I am pretty particular about the stuff that i use. I am writing at least part of this on my iPad mini I got for my birthday a couple of years ago. I use it basically everyday for something. I do most of my reading on it, as well as some basic web stuff that I don't necessarily need my computer for. It isn't the fastest tool for writing, but works well enough when I travel and don't want to pack my laptop on a flight.
My day job is as an engineer for an aerospace company. I am a Mac user at home and use a PC for my work stuff, so I needed to have all of my different productivity tools set up so that they would sync between both my work and home set ups. I have one of those jobs where ideas, thoughts and action items come to mind, even when I am not in my office. They come leave my mind as quickly as they get in there. It isn't just work stuff that this happens to. The idea for this post came to my mind as I was walking from one production area to another while I was at work. I would rather capture the ideas and process them later than hope that I remember them when I am at a good place to write them down.

The Fisher Space Pen with a standard size business card for scale. 

A tool that I use everyday is the common pen. I have to sign documents, write down changes to manufacturing processes as well as take notes in meetings. Me without a pen is like a mechanic without a screwdriver or a doctor without a stethoscope. For my most recent birthday, I got a pen from my family. It may sound simple, but my wife shares my particular bent toward being specific about my tools. She is also really particular about her pens, so she gets my quirkiness. I got a Fisher Space Pen for my birthday. If you are interested, please take a look at the link. I picked the pen, not just because they write upside down, or because they don't leak, but, because it closes up small. I can put it in a pocket in my pants and not feel it stab me in the leg.
The thing about a small pen though is that it has this magical power to disappear. I start and end my day with a clean desk, but as I get going on a project and I have drawings and specs on my desk and on the computer screen, it isn't hard to set a work order down on my pen and not realize it. I found myself to start to worry about losing my new birthday present. It is not a Smeagol kind of worry. I will not refer to my pen as my precious, but, I got it from my family, so it has some significance to me. I found myself getting penanoid about losing my present.
I think this is a feeling that most people get. It probably isn't about a pen, but it could be a family heirloom, or a gift from a relative that has passed away, or an award from a hard fought competition. I am not advocating that people should be possessive about their stuff, far from it. I like my pen, but I love my family.

2015. Wow, that was fast.

It has been a really long time since I published anything here. I have seen it written in a lot of places that a person writes what they know. There are some interesting challenges in finding things to write about when you are not allowed to talk specifically about two of the biggest areas of your waking life. About five years ago, my wife, and I became foster parents. Over that time span, we have had 19 kids come into our care. A lot of them have been infants with all different kinds of medical needs. Most of them went home to their parents, or other family members. That is, except for four of them.
At the end of October, my wife and I adopted 4 girls and our forever family has grown in a very short period of time. They have all been with us for quite some time and we have treated all of the kids in our care as though they were ours, but these four will be with us forever and share our last name. Nice thing is that, I can talk a little about them if I choose to without getting in trouble. I am not turning this in to a parenting blog, but I can refer to them as I write about the occasional family adventure.
As far as work stuff, I spent 7 months taking classes on export law compliance. I was not able to find any blogs or podcasts on the subject and I can totally understand why. Unless, it is something that you have to work with on a daily basis, it is the kind of thing that would put a person to sleep in no time. I have discovered the cure for insomnia.
In between work and kids and life stuff, with a little bit of sleeping in between, I got serious about running and started to do it on a consistent basis.

What scared me straight?

What put reality in my face and cause me to take some changes seriously?

It was the scale.

Our scale is not something special, or unique. It doesn't yell at me like a drill sergeant and call me names. It just sits there. I stand on it and it tells me a truth that I could not ignore. In June, it told me that I was really close to being 300 pounds.  Between that and the size of my pants, I knew that I had to change things. I was getting ready to adopt four children and I knew I had to make sure that I was around for them.
So, it started. I started. I started to get up at 4 in the morning. Every day. At a time, when rock stars are starting to think about the second party of the night, I was thinking about the road ahead of me. I realized that running was going to be the easiest form of exercise for me to take up. I live in a small community and there were no gyms any where near me. I could swim in the lake, but I didn't want to be mistaken for a wayward walrus. I do have a bike, but it is in need of some repairs. I had the shoes, the clothes and found the time in my schedule to make it happen, so, away I went.
It started slow. I did more walking than running. The key for me was being consistent. get up at 4 everyday and putting the miles in. I also setup a play list on my phone to listen to during my run. I think a lot on the road in the morning and I needed to have something else going through my head than my day ahead. Over time, I worked and I got to the point where I was running more than walking. Later it got to where I was running the whole thing. I now running the whole thing for about 3.5 miles every morning. Some days, I feel like going farther and I have a route in my neighborhood that gets me there.
I have come to really enjoy it. For some people that my sound like crazy talk, but that is where I am. The girls, except for the little one, came out with me on Thanksgiving morning. They did not go as far as I did, but it was more about the memories than the miles. I had fun with it too.

This mornings run was my longest of the year at 6.27 miles. I even went up this intimidating hill for the first time that is behind our house. It is something that I am going to have to spend some time in 2016 getting stronger at.
I want to get back in the habit of writing here too. Two term papers a week for 7 months as well as my normal work kind of pushed away any fun writing, but I feel like I have something to say that may help someone and I won't find my voice if I don't start talking.

Happy 2016 everyone!!