Evie Day 251

Good morning, happy Wednesday. ‘Tis humpday, ’tis Thanksgiving Eve, and it’s a morning where I will get to enjoy fresh cinnamon rolls while my youngest daughter and granddaughter come over for a visit here in the next fifteen to twenty minutes.

My granddaughter is now crawling, so that will affect everything around here. Crawling leads to walking and walking leads to running, and that leads to little ones needing safe places to land. We’ll have to keep an eye on the corners, as we don’t want the little one to need a stitch in her chin or her cheek… like her momma had to have after falling into a media cart while she danced to the Barney theme music at daycare some 24 years ago.

I have not had a good week as a sports fan. Kansas football lost, Kansas City Chiefs lost on Monday Night Football, and the Jayhawk basketball team fell to #4 Marquette – I do not like losing to Shaka Smart ever. Tonight the Jayhawk men’s basketball team will play for third place at the Maui Invitational versus Tennessee, and they are going to give Kansas al they want.

The Chiefs loss was a hard one… Kansas City proved that the position title “receiver” was an honorary title, as the passing game suffered from 26 dropped passes, including a drop on 4th down and a drop in the end zone that would’ve won the game.

I didn’t write a blog post yesterday. WordPress was acting squirrelly, so I went back to tending to my rat-killing.

About time to do that again…

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all .

Evie Day 249

Good morning, happy Monday, and I hope my American friends have a wonderful week of Thanksgiving and the truth about the origins of this country. Today is 20 November 2023.

Lisa and I had a weekend trip down to Wichita to see a comedy show at the Crown Uptown Theater. It was a lot of fun, spent time with a couple of Lisa’s friends from before we started dating in ’95, and stayed overnight at the Marriott… got to get use out of those points! We saw Steve Hoffstetter and a few opening acts, one pretty good, a couple that were a little more forgettable. All in all, it was a great time, and Lisa and I reflected that we should do that more often.

I’m on vacation this week, but that doesn’t mean the work goes away. I’ve got plenty to focus on today and the rest of the week before we close out the year. I’ve got a daily minute to record here shortly, so after I get this cranked out and posted, it’s off to the studio to record.

Two games of interest tonight… the Kansas City Chiefs play the Philadelphia Eagles on Monday Night Football, while the Kansas Jayhawks play in the first round of the Maui Classic (now on Oahu, due to the fires on Maui a couple of months ago). The Jayhawks will play Chaminade tonight. I don’t think the Chaminade team will give Kansas much trouble, but there have been times in the past when Chaminade has been an early-season spoiler for some big-name squads… granted, that was twenty or thirty years ago, and the local team might have lost the element of surprise.

I’m going to get this in the can and get to work.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 246

Good morning, and happy Friday to you all. Today is 17 November 2023.

I returned home from my company off-site meetings at about 11:00 PM last night. I felt good to sleep in my own bed last night.

Now I’ve got some work to do.

For me, going to these sorts of meetings gives me a better foundation for the rest of the year. I have a better idea about the next steps.

Now I need to put the ideas I learned into action.

I’m not going to take a lot of time writing more about work stuff, but I could. It was a positive few days.

I just wanted to get this post cranked out to stay on top of my personal writing commitment.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 245

Good morning, and a happy Thursday to you all. It is 18 November 2023. Hard to believe how fast this month is going by.

My team meetings are getting wrapped up today. After that, the focus shifts to “what comes next”. We’ve been spending a lot of time talking about AI and security, a couple of very hot topics at the office. I’m excited about what comes next.

I’ll be playing a role in today’s meetings, as we switch from the Americas teams to our individual regions. We’re doing a charity project, and we’re also playing a game. Each of these has some significant involvement from your truly.

Yesterday we had a charity event, a team-building exercise followed by building bicycles for kids. Somewhere during the team building component, I bent or twisted wrong and tweaked my back right in front of my coworkers. My groan was audible… and an accurate vocalization of what I was feeling at the time. I ended up returning to my room and lying down for a while. I was ok for last night’s team dinner. Everything wraps up this afternoon, and then I’ll head home to sleep in my own bed tonight.

Not much else to report that I can talk about. A family member got a nasty cut on a finger that led tp six stitches, but that’s news for that family member to discuss, not me.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 244

Good morning, and a happy Wednesday to you. It is 15 November 2023.

Last night was weird.

I was supposed to go on a boat trip and dinner with my work teammates, but late in the afternoon I was getting an odd feeling. Felt a little light-headed, got the impression that my blood pressure was spiking, and decided that maybe spending two hours on a boat was not the best idea. Even after I made that decision, the feelings didn’t subside for a while. The closest I can get to describing it was a panic attack, which I have had in the past. My apologies to my team for missing out, but I do think it was for the best. I didn’t want to turn into a 275-pound pile of vibrating, sweating goo in front of people. Better to stay in the hotel room and calm back down.

More meetings today. Then another dinner, but this time, just the west coast team. I should be ok.

I watched a little bit of the Kansas college basketball game – not all of it, which would be a first for me in a long time. I’m usually pretty good about staying up, but I turned the game off with ten minutes remaining just because I was exhausted.

Not much else to share, really.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 243

Good morning, and a happy Tuesday to you. I wish you peace, happiness, and tacos on this Tuesday, 14 November 2023.

I had a great time last night hanging out with some folks that I had not seen in quite some time and finally meeting a number of folks that I have worked with for a while but had yet to meet face to face. It was a lot of fun and provided me with a sort of energy that I kind of needed at year’s end. All too often when you work from home, you don’t get to have these in-person get-togethers, so it was most welcome.

One of the things we watched and talked about was sports, and there were definitely some things to talk about as we watched the Denver Broncos upset the Buffalo Bills at home. It was a rather stunning outcome, and quite the game, with a dramatic finish as the Broncos placekicker missed his field goal attempt, down one, with time running out on the clock – but with the quick reset the Broncos ran to set up the kick, the Bills were confused and had 12 men on the field – one too many. The second attempt from five yards closer sealed the game for the Denver squad. I have some Bills friends who will not be happy.

I’m going to have a full day of meetings today, and there might even be a sighting of me with a guitar in my hands tonight. Not making any promises.

That’s enough for today. Time to go hunt for a cup of coffee and grab some breakfast.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 242

Good morning, and a happy Monday to you all. It is 13 November 2023.

Did my regular thing this morning, trimmed my beard/goatee thing with the electric trimmers, brushed my teeth, and jumped in the shower to finish up the task at hand. Coffee is brewing, and I’ll toss a little container of leftover corned beef hash into the microwave as soon as I get this post completed.

Sports guy Bob had a mixed weekend. Friday night, the Jayhawks put on another show on the basketball court for an easy win, a tune-up game prior to tomorrow night’s match against the Kentucky Wildcats. The Kansas football team had some struggles Saturday against Texas Tech, with player after player walking off or being helped off the field with injury after injury, including our second-string quarterback, Jason Bean, who has been leading the offense most of the season following the injury to our starting QB in the third game. Our freshman walk-on QB did outstanding work in his surprise effort, but Kansas left a little too much time on the clock, and Tech scored a field goal with the clock running out. Dang it.

I’ve got some work meetings this week. That’s kind of the focus this week. Next week, I’m taking some time off for the Thanksgiving holiday week.

Not much else to report, really. Almost lost my dwarf cleric yesterday during the role-playing session… but he could stand a rebuild following a computer crash. Lost a lot of his details, so it’s a good time to rebuild him right with all of his skills, abilities, and healing potions intact.

That’s enough for now. I’ve got stuff to take care of.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 239

Good morning, and a happy Friday to you all. It is 10 November 2023.

I’m thinking sushi for lunch with my son, schedule permitting.

My mind is in a bit of turmoil today. There are any number of things I need to focus on and more than a couple of distractions at the moment, most notably my boy Odin expressing his dismay over the lack of surplus bacon on my wife’s breakfast plate.

Everybody has “stuff”. I’m kind of in a box this morning – I have a report to complete regarding my work activities, and I have to reconcile that I haven’t been that great at compartmentalizing my life – I have a lot of “creep” between the various aspects of my life, from one box into the other, and I need to do a better job managing that.

You know what… maybe I just ought to focus on that stuff right now. I get up in the morning and I write this, and to a degree, writing can be therapeutic. Write now I just feel like I need to get this done and get back to focusing on the other stuff.

Odin is still whimpering at my wife’s feet. He’s a noisy boy. Squeeky.

Might be time to oil the dog.

OK, rather than sit here and think about the other things I need to do, I’m going to get on them.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 238

Good morning, and a happy Thursday to you all. It is 9 November 2023.

I do pay attention to the political landscape, and sometimes it terrifies me. The prospect of Trump getting back in the White House is something I do not want to face, and as I look at some of the polling data, it is one I likely have to face. I couldn’t believe the American people would be so gullible back in 2016 when he was elected, and after all of the facts that have come out, it it still within the realm of possibility that he could return to the presidency.

Through Mitch McConnell’s machinations, he put three justices on the Supreme Court, when, if this had been handled as it has been in the past, Trump would’ve likely had only one. Scalia’s vacant seat was not filled because it was an election year, and Ginsburg’s seat was filled because it was.

Politics are sickening in America.

I’ll wrap up my solutions architecture class today. It’s been a good week with a small group. I would’ve liked to have had more of my learners active in the chat, but I also respect that some like to sit back and listen. I’ll just accept the reality of it and focus on my part of in the delivery.

I’m a little tired this morning. Neighbor dog up late barking. Even in the country, there are still some inconsiderate dog owners that leave their dogs out too late and too loud.

That’s enough for now.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.

Evie Day 237

Hi! My name is Bob, and I write a blog Monday through Friday. Today is Wednesday, 8 November 2023.

I get up at 5:30 AM to get ready for my day, and I try to crank out a couple hundred words about what is going on in my personal and professional life. I am married, the father of three kids, and the grandfather of one little girl who is 237 days old.

I track the number of days I have been alive. The average person lives between 28,500 and 30,000 days. As of today, I’m at 21,968. I turned 60 years old in September.

I am a technical trainer by profession. I have a college degree, and I have been working with computer since the late 70s, when I discovered the first PC purchased by my high school stashed in a chemistry classroom storage closet.

I’m geeky, nerdy, and I used to be a little bit athletic when I was a kid. I like to play guitar, but I do not read music. I like to play golf, but truth be known, I haven’t picked up a golf club since I started working for my current employer almost five years ago.

I work from home. I spend my days talking to people all over the world about cloud technologies. Right now I am starting day three of a course on cloud solutions architecture.

I have four dogs. We used to have five, and lost one of our beloved pooches in September, and I do miss her. She was a wonderful dog.

Tonight there will be a debate between most of the GOP candidate for the presidency, while the leading candidate, currently facing 91 counts in 4 jurisdictions, has a rally down the road where he doesn’t have to share a stage with anyone else. I think I’ll be focused on my game night with the guys instead.

That’s just a little slice. I write a post like this every now and then to kind of ground myself and remind myself of who I am and what I do. I don’t claim to be anything more than what I am. I just want to be a genuine guy with hopes and fears like anybody else.

That’s good enough for now.

I always close my posts with two lines.

I hope the world is treating you better than you deserve.

Peace y’all.