Monthly Archives: February 2011

Mr. Freeze…

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It snowed in West Tennessee today, but that’s not exactly the freeze that is troubling me at the moment. It seems that news of my imminent departure for Pennsylvania was broken prematurely. Though not quite ready to retract the story, I’m moving it from the “cautiously optimistic” column to the “possible” category. It seems that in the interests of driving down operating expenses, Uncle has imposed a 30-day hiring freeze for civilian positions with the Department of the Army. Tacking that 30 days onto the 20 I had already waited to get the official offer and I can’t in good conscience rely on seeing a positive outcome. I suspect the human resources policy geniuses deep in the bowels of the Pentagon are using this 30-day hiring holiday to devise even more diabolical procedures that will make hiring and transfers even more complicated, cumbersome, and time consuming than they already are. None of this bodes well for a speedy exodus from the current unpleasantness. My expectations of enjoying springtime in Pennsylvania are fading rapidly.

This is why I’m generally happier when I’m in full pessimist mode – disappointments there don’t come as a surprise. They’re just the normal state of affairs and when things did go right, it’s an occasional pleasant surprise. I don’t know that I could ever be a real optimist. I couldn’t tolerate being so regularly disappointed when things go to hell in a handcart. At this point I’m driving on purely because I trust absolutely in my own abilities and the simple fact another six months of uncertainty is better than the absolute certainty of being stuck where I am. Just call me Mr. Freeze.

Chaos Theory?

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I can tell by the gently worded reminder from WordPress that it’s time to renew my domain mapping fee, that this little endeavor is slipping towards its one year anniversary. It’s been said that time flies when you’re having fun. Apparently it also flies when you spend most of you free time plotting ways to extract yourself from situations less than good. That’s not to say that it hasn’t been a good year overall. Me and mine all remain on the correct side of the dirt, so really, everything else is just gravy. Still, though, it doesn’t feel like a year since I started poking around at this thing. I’ve been toying around with the idea of a facelift for the site. Maybe revamping the tags, lists, and sidebars. I wish I had spent a little more time learning the controls before diving right into with a new host. There are alot of the layout that I’m not quite pleased with, but just haven’t taken the time to make right.

One of the biggest issues I’m currently having with blogging is what feels like a lack of focus. Sure, I’m writing whatever happens to be on my mind at the time, but aside from “work sucks, trying to change it” and “people suck, trying to avoid them” there isn’t much of a thread that unifies the whole. Categories and tags are haphazardly applied (when I remember to list them at all) and it feels a bit like every post is adding that much more chaos to the mix. Was that a long way of saying I’d like my place in the internet to be as well-ordered as my place in the real world? Probably. OCD clearly doesn’t make a distinction between the real world and the electronic one. In a perfect world, I’d have my message calendar all mapped out months in advance and know exactly when I wanted to write about which topics. Not a chance of that happening any time in the near future, so I’ll content myself with coming up with a way to make it all a little more coherent.

You may see some changes in the next couple of days/weeks or you might not. It mostly depends on whether the dust building up on every flat surface of the house or the disorganized musings of my curmudgeonly mind win the prize as most in need of a good going after. Of course it also depends on how much time Maggie gives me before trying to climb up on the desk… Like she’s doing now.

Terms…

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It’s possible that I’m starting to come to terms with living in a state of perpetual uncertainty. Maybe there’s a two week maximum on anxiety of this sort. After taking counsel in a dear friend last night, I’m reminded that getting things done the Army way can take much, much longer than should be reasonably expected. It’s not so much that I don’t care as it is that I’ve seemed to move beyond the point where fretting about it is worth the effort. It’s really an occasion where all there is to be done is lie back and think of England. The alternative is to pick up the phone and start ranting like a lunatic at the guy I’m hoping to work for at some point in the near future. That would probably be the operative definition of a situation other than good at this point. So, until further notice, I wait… and wait… and wait. At some point even the bureaucracy has to grind its way into an actual decision, right?