Don't Look Back..

Find a place to write, minimize distractions

During a long drive last week I was thinking about small airplane crashes (that's been in the news) and thought about a former co-worker who pilots a single engine low-wing Beechcraft.  We shared a few common interests and a bit of a military background.  He was a decorated soldier rising in the ranks to E-8.  Temperamentally I was not a real natural fit for the military although I still dream about small infantry and artillery individual and crew-served weapons.  During my tenure as Chief Process Improvement Officer (CPO) in my 27-year gig my military experience arose.  The services are quite good at breaking down complex tasks to manageable pieces that literate but not necessarily educated people can follow.  My co-worker and I frequently discussed this.

A couple of years older than me he has experienced a few lifestyle altering physical issues and remarked once "I don't have long and I want to enjoy each day."  That was really good advice from a person who made sense about half the time.  Last week during our conversation he really wanted to know why we were talking after two years.  I said that airplane crashes has been in the news and I was checking to see if he was dead.  The response indicated that we would not be talking were he dead to which I responded "are you sure."  We chuckled about Verizon and "can you hear me now" and moved on to the next topic.  He'd heard that I was gone showing some surprise that I'd lasted as long as I did given the organizational changes.  With confidence and more happiness shown than during his working years he commented "I'm sincerely glad I'm gone, I have enough money and I never look back."  That was the second good piece of advice.

Obviously the focus was on finding new employment or sources of income.  Now as I approach two years of not having a good job or a dumb job I'm looking at the twenty-four months wondering what I've accomplished.  Certainly there are some tangibles, one house remodeled, a condo demoed and not remodeled, children's possessions removed and re-positioned, much progress in web monetization, new personal branding, small business stability, many old trees downed, far more planted, on and on.

One of the original goals was to post to this blog daily.  My son indicated that I'd fail at that and I did.  In setting goals one has to track the progress made, celebrating in that and re-considering the language and the metrics of the goals.  Doing that I have written a few hundred posts here and a couple of scores on our food blog.

Writer's Inc.

Both of my kids write well.  This past week I was going through books left by my youngest to donate and opened Writer's Inc.  My son indicated that my daughter used it in high school so it's been floating about our house for fifteen years and I'd never seen it.  Well laid out but written for a younger reader the first few pages addressed the challenge of all writers...no ideas, can't start, distractions, bad topic, no topic and I could say many more but the key is to start.

This afternoon after working on remodeling, donations, accounting, automobile sale and small business issues I stole an hour to do what one is supposed to do; find a place to sit and write.  Bruegger's is close by.  It's not crowed in the afternoon.

Of course you can spend more time reading about writing, planning a workout rather than sweating and complaining about government than being part of the process.  Not everything is epic.

Practical Items...

• My outplacement consultant has left the firm.
• I still have access to some of the online resources and have been beefing up on Linux
• Wordpress training
• It's pretty clear that from a branding perspective you have to use Wordpress, probably self-hosted.  That needs to be prioritized.
• Monetization, advertisements need to be jacked up.
• Downloadable content is important for blogs.
• Don't look back.  Organizations change, sometimes for the better or the worse.  They often discard their most valuable resources.  Leverage that perspective forward.
• The personal brand has waned.  Get cracking on the blogs (daily) and LinkedIn content weekly.
• The small business web presence needs work.
• There are a zillion food blogs, some of them very rich in return; leverage that into the "looking for a job" context.

Medicare...
Now in my six month window to sign up for Medicare I made my first pass at understanding it.  Everything I know:

• Medicare is comprised of parts A, B, C & D
• Parts A & B are standard essentially for hospital issues.
• Regular doctor visits are not covered.
• Part C is also known as Medicare Advantage.  You can work through local HMOs or PPOs who receive payment for Parts A & B.  
• Part D is drug coverage.  This is optional.  Some Medicare Advantage plans have drug coverage, others do not.
• Premiums are indexed to income.

That's all I know.  Thinking about Medicare and thinking about getting a dumb job are not incompatible thoughts.