Motivation – Check!

I believe I have the source/root cause of my recent malaise…….. I was doing it every day and didn’t even realize it. I was becoming stagnant – not progressing in much of anything and it was affecting my mental edge. Don’t ask me how I figured this out; it just came to me as I was trying to think back in my military days when I felt as bleak and that’s about the time it hit me. I pretty much have a couple of choices: make my workday more enjoyable or upgrade.

I’m not really a person that can put on a fake smile and do the false motivation thing, but there are a few things I can try to improve the attitudes of those around me, hopefully making my work environment that much better. Or I can look for a better work environment……….. the economy notwithstanding, the new/better work environment may have to be a long term goal, and one way to move forward toward that goal is to GET CERTIFIED! It was pretty simple all along…..

Motivation Check……..hmmm not there yet

But getting better……….lol

Seriously, I’ve  spent more time considering WHY I want to continue the IT track/network track I think I’m on.  I’ve asked myself some tough questions; why do I do what I do? Do I really like what I do?  How far do I want to go in this field?

Good questions all, but the answers aren’t necessarily important right now – what I think is important is my attitude throughout all this, and it is improving (Thankfully).  I’m spending additional time at work actually getting to know the network and infrastructure and understanding it – and I like it.  I made a point to NOT  study any Cisco CC## material and just went with the flow and what I know.  I think it was a good choice.

I’m still  not ready to dive back into any study material, but based on this recent turnaround (Improvement) in my attitude, I don’t think it will be too long before I’m ready.

Not Going to Make my Certification Goal/Deadline

Less important to me is that I missed the dates I wanted to have my CCENT certification by; what is more important, and downright confusing to me now is WHY I’m not even slightly motivated to get this certification.  I was going damn near overboard in the studying; I had even learned my weakest area (Believe me, I was VERY weak) of Subnetting, I mean I could take a question about subnetting and not even produce a drop of sweat – THAT’s how far I’ve progressed with Subnetting.  See, I even capitalize the word out of reverence to the enormity of the task…………….

Anyhow, I wanted to have the CCENT by Thanksgiving and the CCNA by the end of January and this is not going to happen, at least not until I get the fire back for the Cisco networking subject(s).  One thing I will not do is waste the $$ taking the test and potentially failing because somehow I’ve lost my motivation.   I’ve tried a few things already to try and get the interest back.  I’ve avoided all “studying” aside from the things I do at work that are networking related.   I just feel blase’ about the whole thing; I cannot explain it other than to say I asked myself what the advantages of being certified would be and I could not come up with an answer.  I think my current job just might be bringing me down a bit when it comes to advancing my career.  I’m going to try a few other things and try to get back into the study when Christmas break is over; maybe by then I’ll have answered the motivation question.

Anyone found a “USEFULL NEED” for Twitter?

I ask this because I do use Twitter; it’s not my favorite or anything, in fact, I wouln’t lose a wink at night if it just died and went away.  I’m not trying to trash it in any way, but I just don’t see the usefullness of Twitter aside from mildly entertaining quips from your friends (At best) to updates (As if you need them) from you favourite social celebrities (At worst).

In many ways, Twitter seems to bring together all that is useless and make it seem more useful…………. wow, that didn’t make any sense at all, and yet I understand it.  What do I use Twitter for?  Honestly, I don’t “USE” Twitter in the sense that I need it; I joined a couple of years ago to see what it was all about, and aside from about a million more people on it now………. not much has changed other than the number of mini-apps/clients for Twitter.  Have I really learned anything by being on Twitter?

Sadly, I’d say no other than to reiterate my knowledge of human nature;  people want to be seen/known, and what better way to show it than with your own Twitter follower stats??  Nothing like soothing the savage ego, eh…..??

LATE EDIT:

I realized that Twitter is still in its developmental stage and that while it is great to catch up on your friends/acquaintences, it can also be useful for keeping up with family and work stuff; right now it is not useful for that, but every person has a different situation so there you go.  Right now businesses by majority don’t want their employees twittering all day long, and I can see why, but I also see the potential of Twitter to bring groups together.

Learned a New Trick Today….. or How to Kill a Domino Server

ROFL!!  This is the “shiite”, as they say……….. couldn’t make this up if I wanted to.  The day before a long 4 day weekend – things seem to be going well enough; not too many PICNIC situations (You either know this one or you don’t…) and it’s nearly lunchtime.  Suddenly, as all things seem to occur………..  the Lotus Notes server stops responding.  Never fear, we can ping and do just about anything else to see the server VM is up……..  however, about a minute after the “crisis”, a well respected user comes to us and says “I think I might have killed Lotus Notes”.  Hmmm………….. you don’t say.   User explains that he created an email, added an attachment (25+MB) and sent it to the ENTIRE COMPANY……TWICE

Company is ~300′ish….. and the server VM noted above is an x86 VM sitting on a software managed SAN……joy. Thankfully the user did come to us and tell us what he did, many wouldn’t.  I watched on the VMware Vcenter server as the Domino server spiked for about an hour and was unresponsive.  Ended up restarting the server and as VM restarts go – this one took almost 30 minutes to come back to life.  In the end it was all good…………….. but DAMN!  If a USER (Read=NON admin) can do this with a simple JPG attachment, think of the possibilities………… er….. I mean the potential DOS vulnerabilities……….   NOTE: Lotus Notes is not and never will be the choice of our IS admin group; we are simply stuck with the thing, as it’s admin’d at another site.

Some days you just want to go back to pen/paper…………….

Hitting the Wall (With Head)

I seem to have reached that point in my Cisco studying where all I hear is blah-blah-blah…………… and nothing is sinking in, or I’m getting too distracted to pay attention.  I have hit the wall…………….  and I don’t like it.  This is no way to prepare for a test of the type and magnitude that is Cisco.  Have I lost motivation?  I don’t really know.  Do I think I know it all?  Hardly.

I could perhaps be thinking internally that even if I do pass (Sorry… WHEN I pass) that it won’t mean anything at my current job – which brings up another point of discussion – how to “advertise” my new status and not make it seem like I’m demanding a raise (Won’t happen anyhow) or actively seeking another job.  Not sure where you live,  but in my area, there are little to no jobs in the area of IT/Cisco networking, so maybe I’m thinking this pursuit is fruitless, other than the self gratification of passing a Cisco certification test (I passed one back in 2000 so I know they’re not a walkover).  Possibly I have a fear that I’ll have to move/travel for any new job related to this certification, and thinking about that, I don’t really want to move at all; we like where we live and I think that if I look at the map, I can find a few areas where I’ve seen some Cisco networking jobs.  Travel? Naaah – I live driving, provided it’s not a 2 hour, one way trip every day.

Maybe I just need to take a break for a week and re-evaluate where I’m at; hopefully that will provide the needed kick to get back into the study.

Friday the 13th – and it’s a GOOD Thing!

As far back as I can remember, Friday the 13th has been a day of dread; nobody looked forward to this day of doom.  However, today that all changed……… and for the better.  Part of the change in attitude is that it’s FRIDAY for pete’s sake!  It’s not Monday…………. so there!  Next, it is PAYDAY Friday – ALWAYS a good thing.  Continuing with the goodness, I finally, after about a YEAR of waiting, have my Google Wave invite!!!  So now I’m basking in a warm glow of happiness, beer (No, not like that…..ewww), and Google Wave…….. ahhhhhhhh, life is good.

Political Tilt……Response to Outrageousness I’ve Heard Lately

I did not intend for my writings to include political leanings; I have them and prefer to keep them to myself, but what I’ve been hearing lately has spurred me to address the insanity I’ve been hearing.

Government health care…  let’s start there shall we?  ”Affordable” health care for everyone……  sounds great right?  Not so fast………  First you have to define “AFFORDABLE”, which in todays reality, is not exactly definable if you want to produce numbers.  In other words, affordable for ME may not exactly be affordable for someone else.  Next up, who exactly is “everyone”?  Technically speaking (I love this, I can work in technical stuff here) EVERYONE IN THE US HAS HEALTH INSURANCE.  There, I said it.  Now the meaning – even if you do NOT have or are not paying for health insurance, if you get hurt or sick, you can still go to any hospital emergency room and CANNOT BE TURNED AWAY for not having insurance.  You will get treated and you will not have to pay.  So what’s the big disconnect here??

Well, there’s a few things and where do I start?  The health care industry is a segment that doesn’t much have to worry about its future-meaining there will always be sick/dying people out there simply by the nature of humans being mortal.  And due to the ever increasing population, that industry is seeing an ever increasing number of people in need of its services.  Get where I’m going here…………??  Enter Uncle Sam, or at least the current batch of government administrators running the show…….using the tired script of xxx# of  uninsured people (Always wonder where those numbers come from) and the “skyrocketing” cost of healthcare, we’re fed the “obvious” solution that government can FIX IT.

Let me explain how we get “skyrocketing” healthcare costs to begin with………….  Most people with jobs and a company health insurance plan know how this first part works: you get hurt/injured/sick and go to your doctor’s office or emergency room or whatever, and with a certain (Usually) small upfront cost you can get the care you need.  You just fill out the paperwork and wait (I do despise the wait).  Now not everyone has a job or a company health insurance plan, so let’s say some of those people get sick/hurt/injured and head on down to the urgent care clinics or emergency rooms.  Because of EXISTING FEDERAL REGULATIONS, nobody can be turned away because of inability to pay (No health insurance) – Big problem there: SOMEBODY HAS TO PAY, it’s a fact of life; nothing is free including healthcare.  So who is paying?

I’ll give you 3 guesses and the first 2 don’t count……… look in the mirror………. YEAH, it’s you (And me, and everyone else) When someone without health insurance incurs a cost in the healthcare system, it HAS TO BE PAID by someone.  What do all businesses do with additional costs?  Correct, those costs are passed along back to the consumer, which = YOU and me.  How is that possible?  You pay higher premiums BECAUSE you are paying for the uninsured showing up and getting “FREE” healthcare.  Now the healthcare systems mostly try to reduce that cost, meaning those uninsured might not be getting the “best” care, but their needs are being taken care of.  I wonder how many really know/understand that the reason for high premiums is to cover the cost of the uninsured;  they shouldn’t even be called “uninsured” – they should be called the freeloaders, as their costs are passed on to those who CAN pay.  Now I know that’s not the “PC” thing to say, but at what point do we the payers stand up and point out the idiocy of the system?

And I want the government running this system?  With their inability to manage anything resembling a business?  I am not against having AVAILABLE healthcare for all; we have that NOW.  I am against this notion of “affordable” healthcare where the governement steps in and tells hospitals/doctors/whatnot how much they can charge for specific services.  That folks has a name and it ends in “ISM” and it’s not capitalism………

Meaningful Training – NEVER Pass the Opportunity

Returned from the Cisco BCMSN training class tired, weary, and much smarter (We’ll see if I can quantify that later) Cisco networking-wise anyhow.

The course was hosted by Global Knowledge and I must say up front – those guys/gals are awesome!  I would definitely take another course from GK given the chance.  The instructor (Rodger Foster) was great – he can be best described as a closet IT geek and total networking genius and I think he might actually be older than me……… possibly, but I digress……   The topic is training and looking at it from a business perspective, meaningful training is difficult to come by, and when you can get it, GRAB IT!  I don’t want to sound like a talking head for GK training specifically, but I now have that experience and it is an experience that should be propagated to others.  I’m sure there are other great IT/network training companies out there, so I’ll save my opinion on who’s best for a later debate – let me know if you’ve had an awesome IT training experience (Or not).

Bottom line is this training motivated me to press on with my Cisco ICND training and will schedule my CCENT test before Thanksgiving (Best case) or definitely before Christmas.

Almost Jinxed Myself……..

I awoke this morning feeling….. odd, but wasn’t sure what it was.  All of a sudden I felt the urge to get to the bathroom and let’s just say I had a healthy “running” career today, followed by feverish aches and general lethargy.  I was very worried……. VERY worried.

But around 4pm/5pm’ish, I felt ok, so decided to take a shower and felt even better.  I’ll still be on my toes until I get to the training tomorrow, but I think I’ve won for now……..