It is Tuesday morning, the 22nd day of November in the year 2022. The second business day of my vacation, and now two days away from Thanksgiving and required travel.

I accept that we travel for Thanksgiving. My mom lives in Clay Center, along with my sister and her family, and now both of my brothers. It’s just the way it is. There have been years when travel wasn’t really practical, with either illness or other responsibilities getting in the way. At times, we have hosted Thanksgiving dinner for friends, and we might be adding another guest or two when we sit down to do our thing.

Two World Cup games are done for the day, including an absolute stunner by Saudi Arabia over Argentina. The number 53 seeded team versus the number 3 seeded team, and it was not Lionel Messi’s day. The Danes and the Tunisians played to a draw, and next up Poland takes on Mexico.

It might be a good day for me to get out of the house for a bit… after all, if Mexico is playing in the World Cup on Taco Tuesday, that might be a sign.

I’m not always really good about keeping my writing up to date when I’m taking a little downtime. Weekends are great for me for writing, and this vacation stretch affects my focus as well.

Time to get back to regularly scheduled daydreaming.

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

Peace y’all.

Monday, 21 November 2022, and Bubba is on vacay.

This morning I still found myself getting up a little early to watch soccer, with England playing Iran in about another hour. Yesterday was the first match of the FIFA World Cup, with the host country, Qatar, losing to Ecuador by the score of 2-0. It was the first time ever that the host country ever lost an opening match – part of me wonder if the Qataris thought they were buying a World Cup win when they bought the tournament a few years ago (people can say that they were “awarded” the tournament, but nobody is that naive).

The second match will be Senegal versus the Netherlands at 10:00 AM my time. I would be inclined to think the Netherlands should be able to handle Senegal, and then the match I’m waiting for at 1:00 PM, USA versus Wales.

I think the USA is going to have a short tournament… being in the same group as England is a bit of a killer, as I fully expect the masters of the English game are going to run over the American squad. I have friends that are a little more optimistic than I am, but I’m pretty realistic. One friend of mine that is more knowledgeable about the state of the sport figures the US will fall to Wales 2-0, then 4-1 to England, and maybe eeking out a win against Iran next Tuesday before heading home humbled in Group play.

There’s a little leftover Eggs Benedict from yesterday… hope that reheats well.

Coffee… need coffee.

Alright, it’s time for me to get off the computer and get on with my day.

Go USA.

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

Peace y’all.

It is Friday! Happy Friday, folks! It is the 18th day of November, and my last day on the job for a week. I have meetings starting in another hour and a half, and I’ll take off a couple of hours early to take a family member to the doctor today.

Early start, early finish.

Dog food commercial… dogs go nuts.

We’ve got a basketball game to watch tonight. Kansas plays somebody… the game hasn’t been hyped to the level of last Tuesday’s game against Duke, but there’s a game nonetheless. Tomorrow will be filled with college football and appliance deliveries. Sunday means the FIFA World Cup starts, along with some professional American football rolling up into the Sunday night game with my Kansas City Chiefs.

Monday morning it gets busy for the rest of the soccer fans, with matches starting at 4 AM local time… the US Men’s National Team will play Wales at 1:00 PM local time.

I’m rather looking forward to it.

Not much else going on in my little corner of the world. I need to get the garbage out to the corner, I guess.

Time to get on with my day. Hey, Elon, have you figured it out yet? Being the richest guy in the room doesn’t make you the smartest guy in the room… just the guy best at exploiting the people smarter than you.

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

Peace y’all.

It is Thursday, 17 November 2022.

This morning I woke up, did my usual routine, then checked my email to notice that my cell phone was no longer authorized on the company site. Working for a technology company can often make you go, “Oh, this is cool”. I never thought I would feel that way about the simplicity of a phone registration system. Worked right the first time, smooth operation. Kudos to the team behind that little marvel.

Today is the last day for me in the virtual classroom until November 29. One module to cover, help out with the labs, a few meetings tomorrow, and then vacation for a week.

Might be time for me to start thinking about Christmas.

But next week… World Cup!

Yes, in the United States, next week’s big event is Thanksgiving, but in the rest of the world, the FIFA World Cup in Qatar is going to be the event of the year. USA starts their World Cup experience on Monday versus Wales, and that match could set the tone for the rest of the tournament. Friday afternoon will cap this first week with USA versus England, and then USA versus Iran the following Tuesday.

Let’s see how long the US Men’s National Team can hang on.

I don’t expect the USMNT to perform up to the standard set by the US Women’s National Team, which is one of the most successful soccer teams in World Cup history.

OK, time for me to think about what comes next, and today, what comes next is breakfast.

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

Peace y’all.

It is Wednesday, 16 November 2022.

Last night the Michigan State – Kentucky game ran a little late with Michigan State winning in double overtime. The game pushed that Kansas-Duke match back almost an hour to a 9:21 start rather than the scheduled 8:30. Lisa and I watched the first half, then recorded the rest of it.

It is now 6:20 in the morning, and we’re getting caught up on the game right now. Two minutes remain, and it is a tight match between two storied programs.

Go Kansas.

48.4 seconds left, Kansas up by 3.

I do love college basketball. I think it’s more enjoyable than the NBA, with the young guys having a little more fun. I have to admit, I don’t know that I would enjoy a game as much if it was my job.

11.8 seconds left, Kansas up by 3.

Jayhawks going to the free throw line with 9.2 seconds left. Make the first… make the second… 5 point lead and a Duke timeout.

Game over. Kansas pulls down the win.

Now back to irregularly scheduled programming.

I’ve got my chili and eggs on standby, and the news is now on. Lisa is dealing with some work-related issues involving students and the trials and tribulations of being a 20-year-old student.

Some guy in Florida declared his candidacy for the US Presidency. I hope he goes away soon.

Time for me to focus on the day before me.

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

Peace y’all.

15 November 2022. It is Tuesday.

Lisa and I are sitting in the living room, I’m on the sofa, and she’s on the loveseat. All of our dogs have gravitated to her, and it’s rather humorous. It’s as if the dogs know who gives out the most treats.

The news is always a mix of the good and the bad. Right now they covering the violent murders of three University of Virginia football players. UVA is shut down for a second day. Yesterday, the University of Wisconsin was shut down as well, as one of the murdered football players was a transfer from Wisconsin.

The good news is that an election denier was denied in Arizona. Kari Lake came up short, and that’s a sign that our democracy is healthy. There is still a possibility that Lauren Boebert could lose her seat in the House of Representatives as she and her opponent are headed for a recount. A number of mail-in ballots are being reviewed, and apparently, in Colorado, folks get a chance to correct mistakes in their mail-in ballots to get them counted.

Tonight, Kansas faces Duke. Bill Self, Kansas’ Head Basketball Coach, is on a self-imposed four-game suspension over the recruitment of a player than never attended the University of Kansas – the player attended Duke. It will be curious to listen to the verbal dance that little factoid will lead to during the game.

Day 2 of my admin course. Central Standard Time, so a slow roll up to the beginning of the day.

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

Peace y’all.

It is Monday morning, 14 November 2022. Today I’ll return to my virtual classroom for a cloud administration course, and I’ll be working with the same training partner I worked with last week.

It’s going t be a week. I have some reports due, so I’ll try to complete those this morning before my class gets going in earnest. We’re delivering on Central Time rather than Eastern Time, which gives my training partner a little break, as he lives in Mountain Time. Last week had to have been pretty rough.

Monday is the first class day, and then an evening of recovery. That’s really the best plan for Monday, as the first day of the admin course is always a challenge getting folks set up in the labs. By the end of the week, everybody ought to be settled in, but day one and day two are always a little more demanding.

Tuesday will be fun. In this admin course, Tuesday is generally a day to focus on networking technologies, which is my favorite day of this class. After the day is over, it’s basketball night, as the University of Kansas Jayhawks take on the Duke Blue Devils in an early season matchup of blue-blood programs. Wednesday is a day, friends get together online for a little virtual tabletop gaming, and then we’ll close out this class with a couple of leftover modules on Thursday, a closing, and open lab time. Friday is meetings/meetings/meetings, and then I’m taking a little time off.

The Kansas City Chiefs won yesterday and moved to sole ownership of first place in the AFC as the Buffalo Bills lost to the Minnesota Vikings.

That’s enough for now, I guess.

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

Peace y’all.

Good morning, a happy Friday to you all, and for those in the western hemisphere, I wish you a peaceful, respectful Veterans’ Day, this 11th day of the 11th month.

There’s news coming over the wire, and it’s meh. There are still election contents that need to be sorted out – and we know that some won’t get properly sorted until next month in the case of the runoff between Warnock and Walker in Georgia.

I’ve got meetings starting in another 45 minutes. Working for an international company means that meeting times fall where they may. East coast schedule early in the day, west coast schedule later in the day.

I’ve got a delivery coming later today, a new laundry machine, to replace one that has been problematic (intermittent pauses… can take hours to get a load of laundry done, and requires constant checking to see if it paused). I can’t help but wonder if it isn’t simply a firmware upgrade from working right. The same model was available on sale for about half of what we paid for the original, and a 5-year warranty was available for it, so I think a timely upgrade will work out for the best.

Russia is testing a nuclear-powered drone torpedo. Yay.

OK, time to get this in the can and get back to irregularly scheduled programming. I might be taking the weekend off from blog posts.

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

Peace y’all.

“Odin, you are a bundle of joy… and other stuff”

My wife’s words just a moment ago while we wait on the morning coffee to brew up.

Today is Thursday, 10 November 2022. We are still watching election returns, and there are a number of very tight races left over from the election on Tuesday, and some of these contests are going to head to a runoff in December.

There was no red wave.

There is still a chance that the GOP will take control of the House and the Senate, but at this point it looks more like a stalemate. Some seats lost, some seats gained, but the wave that normally happens in midterms. I can live with that.

Today is the last day of my cloud security course, and I have had an absolute joy working with my training partner this week, and he and I work together next week for a cloud administration course.

Kind of funny… I went into LinkedIn to check on a couple of old coworkers and noticed a couple of folks have changed positions since I left that office. Looks like they’ve had to pivot following industry changes and the pandemic. I hope folks are ok.

I remember when I gave my notice back in 2019. I remember telling them that I was taking this opportunity because I thought that if certain market conditions played out the way I thought they might, I needed to make a move as I might be out of a job in a few years if I didn’t.

I’m no oracle, but that was eerily prescient.

Kansas has a basketball game tonight versus North Dakota State. Weather is making a hard turn towards winter with the cooler weather. New washing machine arrives tomorrow. There’s plenty of stuff going on.

I’m going to go tend to my rat killin’.

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

Peace y’all.

It is Wednesday, 9 November 2022. Right now I’ve got the news on, and they are reviewing the election results – at least the ones they can review – and it doesn’t look like there was a wave or a tsunami or whatever people wanted to call it.

Right now it looks like not much is going to change at all.

And that’s fine with me.

I’ll return to my virtual classroom here in another hour and get settled in, and the nice thing is that I won’t have to worry about too many distractions.

Other than that, it’s back to life as we know it.

Lisa has some work to do today – she is focused on getting a grant proposal in under a midnight deadline today, so I’ll make sure she has dinner tonight. I’ll tuck myself off into my workspace this evening and stay out of her way.

Oh, man… I have to admit that I am somewhat relieved at the results I’m seeing. This is NOT what the opposition party was hoping for, and I am glad.

Yesterday folks demonstrated some sense. They recognized that the economic problems we are facing are problems we all face everywhere in the world.

Things are manageable. We can get through this with the leadership we have in place.

Hey, I’m going to get this in the can and get on with my morning.

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

Peace y’all.