Monday, July 28, 2008
Highway in the Wind
Like many of my generation, I love to get out on the highway and just head somewhere. And, over the years, I've encountered a number of artists who seem to "get it" when it comes to travel songs. Mary Chapin Carpenter has no equal. The theme music to the movie Top Gun goes well with traveling. But one of my favorite singer/song writers from the days of tie-dyed shirts and shoulder-length hair, Arlo Guthrie, really captures the mood in his song Highway in the Wind from the Alice's Restaurant LP. Back in 1972, I seldom hit the road without putting Arlo's tape on the 8-track and cranking up the volume. Oh yes, I can hear it now...
Sunday, July 27, 2008
In the "teens" at last
Well, come Monday morning I'm going to be a "teen" again. That's right, tomorrow morning when I arrive at work I'll have only 19 days left on the clock before I turn off my office computer for the last time, hand over my keys, and say adios to the Nevada Department of Public Safety. It's been a strange twelve years to say the least.
I wasn't hired by Public Safety; it was more like I was Shanghaied. Twelve years ago I was happily working for the Department of Parole and Probation as their Management Analyst. I had just been promoted to that Department's one-and-only Network Specialist because most of my MA duties had, in fact, revolved around keeping the agency network running. Even though I had no formal training as a Network Specialist, had never even seen a network when I was put in charge of one, I managed to keep all my users happily computing for seven years starting in 1989. My duties ranged from running co-ax cable, building computers out of spare parts, and writing database software, to supervising the data-entry unit, functioning as resident statistician, and planning for yearly technology expenditures.
But in 1996 everything changed. That's when the Department of Parole and Probation became a division within the Department of Public Safety. Unfortunately, one of the first things that the new expanded Department of Public Safety did was pull all technology staff into one location to work under one supervisor. Instantly I went from being a big fish in a very small pond who reported directly to the Chief of P&P, to a very tiny fish in a huge pond where no one really thought I had enough experience to be working in the job to which I had just been promoted. To say they really didn't want me on the team is probably understating it.
Still, it seems that I have outlasted all my detractors. I've faithfully performed my duties to the best of my ability for twelve years and been absent from my workstation the merest handful of days in all that time. In fact, even after giving away literally hundreds of hours of my sick leave to less fortunate fellow employees, I'll still be retiring with over 1,750 hours of sick leave on the books and 300 hours of annual leave.
Along the way I've made a lot of friendships that I will always treasure. Because the agency relegated me to desktop support for most of my career here, I was able to move throughout the division helping an wonderful variety of folks with a daunting variety of problems, which kept the job exciting, interesting, and rewarding. So, though I didn't get to rise in management as I surely would have done if I had remained at Parole and Probation, I gained a much wider appreciation of technology from the ground up. In the trenches is where the action is. Pushing paper will never be as rich.
Enough said.
I wasn't hired by Public Safety; it was more like I was Shanghaied. Twelve years ago I was happily working for the Department of Parole and Probation as their Management Analyst. I had just been promoted to that Department's one-and-only Network Specialist because most of my MA duties had, in fact, revolved around keeping the agency network running. Even though I had no formal training as a Network Specialist, had never even seen a network when I was put in charge of one, I managed to keep all my users happily computing for seven years starting in 1989. My duties ranged from running co-ax cable, building computers out of spare parts, and writing database software, to supervising the data-entry unit, functioning as resident statistician, and planning for yearly technology expenditures.
But in 1996 everything changed. That's when the Department of Parole and Probation became a division within the Department of Public Safety. Unfortunately, one of the first things that the new expanded Department of Public Safety did was pull all technology staff into one location to work under one supervisor. Instantly I went from being a big fish in a very small pond who reported directly to the Chief of P&P, to a very tiny fish in a huge pond where no one really thought I had enough experience to be working in the job to which I had just been promoted. To say they really didn't want me on the team is probably understating it.
Still, it seems that I have outlasted all my detractors. I've faithfully performed my duties to the best of my ability for twelve years and been absent from my workstation the merest handful of days in all that time. In fact, even after giving away literally hundreds of hours of my sick leave to less fortunate fellow employees, I'll still be retiring with over 1,750 hours of sick leave on the books and 300 hours of annual leave.
Along the way I've made a lot of friendships that I will always treasure. Because the agency relegated me to desktop support for most of my career here, I was able to move throughout the division helping an wonderful variety of folks with a daunting variety of problems, which kept the job exciting, interesting, and rewarding. So, though I didn't get to rise in management as I surely would have done if I had remained at Parole and Probation, I gained a much wider appreciation of technology from the ground up. In the trenches is where the action is. Pushing paper will never be as rich.
Enough said.
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