This week has been about trying up loose ends preparing for the next chapter. Am I going to miss the routine of day-to-day doing something that could end in absolute disaster if I’m not there.
Still bouncing things around about what to do. Whether or not I can earn money on them is far less-important; seeing the arrangement I’m going to have is okay. I really can’t find a better word for it, unfortunately; I’m tired of trying to have other people think I’m just like anyone else physically. I’m not. My protestations to the contrary should probably be met with more than a little skepticism.
What I need to learn to do is not try and find things into which I can throw myself to distract me from the mundane that used to consume so much of my time previously.
Fake TwiX account that’d needle some? Hm. Is there someone else who could do this better than I could? Certainly. Am I going to blow the idea off because I don’t have a co-conspirator interested? Almost certainly.
So, in addition to work stuff, I’ve been running numbers, and making some planes. Short-term Disability until the fall. Probably long-term after that. It’s going to be a pretty significant income cut, but the past few years, for me, have been about doing as much as I possibly can to spare huge tax bills. I’m absolutely certain that there’s someone not far from where I live who’d argue that I’m not paying “my fair share.”
Got it.
We can live somewhat-comfortably really about until my expected end-of-life.
Speaking of that, got news that one of my longest employers died.
When i was getting into the media, I’d heard so many things about how awful iit was to work for him. Maybe it was due to the odd hours I worked most of my time there, but I didn’t have very many experiences with him that you could say were negative.
I did have an instance where I thought I was going to be fired. I was working overnights, doing live assist on things like Coast To Coast AM while prepping for the morning shows. I also inherited a big share of the IT work because I knew how to use free-as-in-beer software (yes, most of it was free as-in-speech, but the in-beer part was biggest concern). After one of the first I’d helped prep for Y2K, helped in the cleanup after Melissa, Badtrans, etc.
The promotions staff were trying to send an email announcement about some event to people who’d subscribed to the station mailing list(s).
All of this was tied to a single server on probably about a 40Kbps fractional T1. The message wasn’t huge, but sending thousands of them over a small pipe took a long time.
I’d gotten off the air at 0600 and gone home. The promotions person sent the email probably just before lunchtime.
I got the first call about the fact that it was taking forever about 1p. I came to, checked the queue, and things were moving, but it was taking a long time.
A lot of the pipe was also being used by other staff doing their normal day-to-day tasks. It’d take a while, but it would finish if the server hadn’t crashed so far. (Mind you, this was probably like a 166 MHz Pentium with about 24M of RAM.)
After that disruption, and I did have to work that night, I got another call probably about two hours later.
The sponsor still hasn’t gotten hist email.
Log back in
It’s still running. Sorry. It’ll go when it goes.
Bob is getting really upset that it’s taking so long.
Half asleep, I exclaimed something like “Fuck Bob! It’ll be done when it’s done.”
He was listening on the call to me. Maybe he urged the staff to call me. I don’t know.
Oh shit, I’m gonna get fired.
Probably 36h later, I got word that he was upset, but he understood. And that I needed to mind my manners.
Sir, yessir.
After I left, he was always very hospitable towards me. I wrote about one of those instances here. His analysis of the crappy little company where I went to work will remain with me forever. I’m saddened by the loss, as I was by the loss of Lisa. No, I didn’t get rich, but I learned things I never would have been able to otherwise.
So, what else?
Current gig filling holes where I can, preparing for my exit, trying hard not to point and say, “I told you so.” But I did. I’ll be heading off, now, and it’s your. Maybe there would have been a way to keep me, but that train’s probably already gone. Oh well.
What am I going to do with a basically open summer for the first time in who knows how long…