Archive for the 'Me, Myself, and I' Category

Dentristry Again

So there I was yesterday morning minding my own business eating my Raisin Bran, when a large part of one of my lower left molars breaks off.  I found myself on a Saturday morning with a quarter of a tooth missing and having to schedule some emergency dental work.  I did make it in to the Dentist, and they put in a temporary filling, but I am going to have to have a crown.  And then I will have to have another crown on the same tooth on the right side.

You see, when my permanent teeth came in several of them were improperly formed with some rather large holes and cracks in them.  My pediatric dentist filled them all with silver fillings – top of the line technology at the time.  The problem with silver fillings is that they slowly cause the teeth to fracture because the fillings expand and contract at  a different rate from the tooth.  So two of my teeth are full of cracks now and have to have the old fillings removed, and crowns put on.  Hopefully the other teeth with silver fillings will hold out longer.

Working on Life

You know, this 7 Habits stuff is hard.  It isn’t easy to sit there and write out what you value, what things mean to yourself, or a personal mission statement.  It sounds easy.  But really examining what it means to you is very difficult.  No wonder they don’t teach this stuff in schools.  It’s too hard for the teachers to understand.

I also suppose that if you don’t have the fall back position of a religion to tell you what you should think and be, that it could be harder for you to come up with the answers.  Yet I think you will have better answers for coming up with them yourself rather than just cribbing something from religion or someone else’s belief system.

This reminds me of when I was on Jury Duty.  One of the attorneys asked if we thought consensus would be better reached by having everyone on the Jury being the same, instead of diverse.  My answer was “It may not be an easy consensus, but it will be a better consensus” for having the diverse Jury.  Same thing with your life.  It may not be easy to plan your life yourself, but you will have a better life for it.

No more quarantine

Yesterday I decided I had had it with being quarantined so I went back downstairs.  I still have a bit of a cough, but otherwise I feel much better.  I got to sleep in my own bed again.  Of course, this also means I am headed back into work today.  I feel ambivalent about work, but I am out of sick leave and really don’t want to use up anymore of my vacation leave.

The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People

So I am now reading The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People.  I have heard about this book for a long time, but I always resisted reading it.  I’m not sure why I was resisting it, as it is a very good book, and I agree with much of the content within it.  The reason I finally picked it up was because I have started to use a FranklinCovey planner (yes, a paper planner).  I was intrigued by some of the pages within it that have you identify your values and write a personal mission statement, so I decided to pick up the book.

Quarantined

I woke up on Thursday with a sore throat and a fever. I decided to not go into work and went to the doctor. They ran tests for Strep, Flu, and Mono. All came back negative. So I’ve been home the past few days (might explain some of the work on the blog).

Because Amy and the kids just got over being sick, I didn’t want to infect them with whatever I had. So my dad came up and helped install our old window AC unit in our bonus room (which is not connected to the duct work for the heat pump). I’ve since quarantined myself up here. It’s very boring, as there is no TV. Thankfully there is Hulu.  I got to watch the new Robotech: Shadow Chronicles movie.   Pretty cool.

I just hope I get over this soon and can rejoin my family.  I really miss getting to hang out with them.  Amy is having to do too much of the chores right now.  She never gets a break.

What happened to DragonBard?

Jury Duty, that’s what.  No futher comments about that experience, other than I am glad it is over.

Amy just got over having the flu.  Care Bear has the flu now.  It is heart rending to see a 3 year old with the flu.  If I am lucky I won’t catch the flu, and can return to work tomorrow.  I took some time off to take care of the kids while Amy was sick.

Do it Tomorrow

So I have been doing a lot of reading and searching on the web on organization and time management.  I’ve read Getting Things Done, and have figured out it’s just not for me.  While searching on the internet I ran across Mark Forster.  I started doing some of the things I found on his website and my productivity increased.  More importantly, my stress level has gone way done.

Mark is beta-testing a new time management system right now, called AutoFocus.  While the concepts in AutoFocus are interesting, I have been reading his book “Do It Tomorrow“.  I have been implementing some pieces of DIT, and I have to say it is actually working for me (something that GTD failed horribly to do).  I really like the ideas in it, as well as the fact that he expects you to be a person, instead of a superman.

Highly recommended.

Up Late

Every so often, I stay up very late.  No good reason.  Just get busy online and I don’t stop.  Tonight is one of those nights.  They are much more rare now that I have kids, but it is nice every now and again to just stay up and play with stuff.  I don’t really accomplish much, and I end up very tired, but it is sort of refreshing.  I guess it reminds me of my days in college staying up late to study and finish assignments.

Though in all honesty, I don’t want to go back to college.  Homework? Ugh.  What is worse is making sure you make it to all your classes and don’t forget anything.  I have very vivid dreams every now and again of me registering for classes and then just not showing up because I forgot there even was a class.  Not something I look forward to.

But yes, the staying up late can be nostalgic.  But I think it is time for me to go to sleep now…

Resolution: Get Organized

I seem to make this same resolution every year.  To get organized.  To stop having stuff overflowing from every horizontal surface.  To know what is going on, to keep good notes, do things on time, and not forget stuff.  It never quite seems to work out the way I want it to.

Right now at both work and home, I have stuff piled up on my desk that needs to be done, filed, or just plain thrown away.  My filing systems are in disarray, my email is overflowing, and I am exhausted from information overload.  I keep far too many things for no good reason, and am loath to toss or get rid of anything that I once thought was cool, or that I used a lot, even though I don’t use it anymore.

Still, I need to get a handle on all this stuff.  I plan to sell off, give away, or toss most of the physical.  It has all become stuff I rarely use, or just plain don’t need.  I’ve already cut down on my books, and have even disposed of my collection of Analog SF magazine.  There’s lots more to get rid of, and of course to organize into some semblance of sanity.

Wish me luck.

Another day

Another day has gone by.  I got quite a bit more done on backup at work on Friday, but I’m not sure the configuration I set up is working correctly.  We are also on track to be completely moved out of the old buildings soon.  I’ll have to head over there again soon to assist with the cleanup.