So as you may have gathered from my last post here and the occasional dispatch from social media, I was in California last week. the photo you see above (and any other photos you might see in this post) is not representive of the views I enjoyed while spending my week in the area around […]

It’s been a hell of a week. I’ve been riding the emotional rollercoaster, given the time of year (I miss my dad). A variable subset of the children have been, shall we say, difficult this week (spring break is coming), though it’s never quite the same problem twice, so it’s hard to nip in the […]

When I had my beloved Pontiac Vibe totalled out from under me a few years back, what I really wanted was to simply grab the more modern replacement, because I loved the thing so damned much. Unfortunately, at the time, both the Vibe, and it’s sibling the Toyota Matrix, had been discontinued. I needed a […]

If you’ve been keeping pace with me at all lately, you know that this has been a hell of a week. the tl;dr version? Doubt. Uncertainty. Signs of problematic developments in the future. Headaches. Lack of sleep. Hopelessness. Depression. As I mentioned earlier this week, there have been some awesome folks out there who have, […]

It’s been a rough kind of week. Upheaveal, and Fear, Uncertainty, and Doubt are currently in power in my organization, I can’t seem to get any of my concerns or questions answered, and none of the timelines I’m able to project from here into the new order seem to work out nicely for me. The […]

Hi. We’re 12 days into the new year; it’s been very much an up-and-down thing thus far. There’s been some good stuff. There’s been some supreme frustration. More than I’d really want; let’s be honest. Work’s a never-ending pile of bluster, bro-ing, business word salad, bad attitudes, belaying progress, blowing off meetings and commitments, and […]

Red Letters by Mikey Mason At long last, today is my last day at work for the year 2015. I’ll be honest, it’s been a tough one. My job changed; hell, my career changed. I spent most of the year just figuring out what the hell I’m supposed to be doing here. One of these […]

So folks…it’s been a week. There’ve been some great, amazing high points, and some startlingly low points, though even during those low points, I’ve had a great bunch of people around to help pull me up (or at least keep me from sinking irretreivably into the abyss). I don’t make much of a secret of […]

I’ve officially been a bureaucrat long enough that the mythical “use or lose” annual leave is a thing. Two years ago or so, my public sector seniority became such that I hit the top tier of vacation time earnings. Combine this with the fact that I’ve swapped positions in the “company” (and even swapped companies […]

Greetings from the mysterious mid-west. I don’t really want to be here, because I’m adding absolutely no value to this test I’m supposed to be supervising/supporting, since the guys who actually do the work have this business down. Also, I have another test going on at home that, frankly, requires a lot more attention. I’m […]