Rantings of a Lunatic

For the month of November, I kept a pretty awesome mustache all month. For the month of December, I gave up shaving. For Christmas, I was given a wet shaving kit, which I had been looking at, but just too cheap to buy. So, today, I shaved off my beard. First, that might have been a dumb way to try to learn the art of wet shaving. But, it worked out. I just trimmed it down to my normal Van Dyke, which may not be as straight as it should, but, thats ok. My face feels great, and the shave is close. I did two passes, mostly because I didn’t want to mess up my sideburns or the region I had designated to remain. I think I might get a little braver, and try for a third pass, to see if I can get it any smoother later this week. Using the brush was awesome, I can’t believe that I didn’t get one, and use it sooner. I think that if I keep this up for a few months, I might make the jump all the way to the straight razor. I keep thinking about it, possibly because its manly. I don’t know, and I don’t want to know if its not the truth, but I assume that Sam Elliot uses a straight razor. Long, sharp, and with some sort of bone handle. But, thats a digression. And I have a project to finish, so, maybe I will post some pics later.

Today was my 1 year anniversary at my current employer. I didn’t make the realization until I was driving home from work, and it was sort of a bittersweet realization. I had known it was coming up for a while, but for some reason it just didn’t occur to me until it was over. And the thing about it is, I am still staring at the same issues, and high-level goals I was looking at a year ago. I have identified plenty of things that need to be updated or upgraded, or even reimplemented. And thats not to say that I haven’t accomplished anything in a year. Rather, I have resolved several initiatives that weren’t pre-existing. I have implemented new systems, and made small adjustments to the way that we do things, and I keep working towards integration and automation, but its a long road to the point where I feel I should be.

A year ago Obama was preparing to take office, and he had won that office on huge plans and lofty ideals. I wonder if he feels the same way. I wonder if he looks at his first year in office, and thinks to himself that he had hoped to have done more. I know that I had hoped to have accomplished so much more, and I am not deciding the future of millions of people. I am only trying to make life easier for thousands of people.

I don’t mean to imply that things are bad, rather, life is probably better for me than it has been in a long time. I am appreciative of where I am, and I am yearning for artistic output. I have been slowly working on a couple of personal pieces of fine art. In addition, I am working to enrich my knowledge of several systems that I have recently encountered, and am trying to get to the point of writing applications for my phone. In general, I am happy. I find that I am still frustrated sometimes, but, I have opportunities to find joy in the little things. I am often reminded to lighten up, and not to sweat the small stuff. I am thankful for that. I also find myself seeing further into the future than I used to. I am not entirely sure why, but, maybe its just that I am getting older. When I last saw my mother she reminded me that I will turn 30 soon. I don’t really ever remember being too concerned with my age, or aging, but its a good thing to stop and think about every once in a while. I am not a kid anymore, I am an adult, though, it really doesn’t feel like it. I find myself thinking about what I am going to do when I grow up. While its not techincally accurate, (I don’t think I will be getting any taller), it can’t be a bad thing to always think that eventually you will have to become more serious, but this isn’t it yet. I still have my toys, though they definately have gotten more expensive, and I still dream about newwer ones. But I also find myself trying to find ways to help others, such as my parents. I don’t have the solutions for things, but, I am not worried by that. I enjoy the search, the move to find the solution.

I have given up the vices that were mentally stifling me over the last year, and thats something that I appreciate as well. Since I quit my addiction to video games, I find that I am able to focus on more things, and maintain my focus a lot better. I still want to play video games occasionally, but, I also have no desire to let it consume my life, waking and sleeping again. I am no-longer interested in RPGs, instead, I am only really interested in playing where I can turn it off at any moment, and there is no obligation or detriment if I don’t login again for months at a time. This alone is probably one of the greatest points of growth that I have personally felt over the last year. While it hasn’t directly affected my math skills, I do feel that I am spending more time mentally calculating now because I am spending more time staring into code. I still regret not taking any math classes in college, because if I had, they would have only strengthened my programming skills, but, thats a lesson I learned after I finished. I feel as thats the lesson to life, once you realize that you should do something, usually its later than you wish you would have.

I generally assume that nobody reads my blog, which is ok with me, I really just write it for myself, and as such, I am starting to feel as if I am rambling, so thats it.