Year end, decade end... hello
Hello,
It's been a while. A real long time. I've not totally abandoned you LJ, not yet at least. I still read LJs from others at least once a week and still use it to communicate. I plan on using it as a blog again at some point, that is if I have time. I keep meaning to blog though and just don't get to it. Lots of changes in everything and I hope to record them here.
Where do I start? This is the last day of 2010. Fun, isn't it? I hope so. Last year a lot of people had reviewed the decade. I am that retentive and exacting that I couldn't do that. I count from 1 to 10, not from 0 to 9. So, here we are at the start of a new decade.... let's look back on the decade that is ending in just over 6 hours from the time I'm typing this. Hm... what a decade it was.
Let me set the stage here and look at the end of the last decade - the 90's. That was a cool decade, wasn't it? I started that decade off by stumbling into an industry and subsequently a career. Embroidery yo. How cool is that? Wasn't what I planned on getting into or even remotely related. Broadcast journalism/telecommunications with a focus on radio broadcasting. Public speaking kind of stuff helped me at trade shows and then giving training classes, plus the bit of computer background helped me wotking on those 286's, which I saw grow to the monsters they are now. So, changing jobs and locations, in 1998 I landed in NC. Charlotte to be specific. Last year of the last decade (soon to be two decades ago), the company I worked for moved locations to a tower in downtown (uptown?) Charlotte and I hated it. I was the last hired so I was the first to go when it all went according to plan by the boss kid (owner's son) of the company and he collapsed it in upon itself. Thankfully, shannontabbycat was working for the UU district office and so my leaving there allowed me to go into business for myself, watch my guys, run the household and not really lose any money or income that we were used to living off of from the previous ten years time or at least that amount of income that I had built up to having. Y'see, she started working and immediately was making more than I had been after ten years in the embroidery industry.
Stage set, there we were at 2000, moving to 2001. By that point I had been suckered in (exaggeration there) to working with the "yoots" as I call them at the UU church. Great stuff. Gave me a reason to exist as I really didn't have a clue how to start up or run a business. Trips to the Small Business Assocation did not help. Working with the yoots gave me a perspective on reality that I had lost. It gave me hope and I was encouraged that the future held some pretty good things as they, the yoots that is, were pretty cool people. Still in touch with a few of them today and I thank them for being and also for being so awesome. I've loved watching them turn into humans, vicariously growing up with them. Imagine that, some of them have exceeded me in that "growing up" concept.
So, 2001 comes along. Am I up for a quick recap? Sure... here we go by year...
Hmm... let's make this a brief recap, shall we? Okay...
2001 - sucked. Incidents in NYC (my sister was a block from it), incidents at the UU church (seriously? you painted over their art?), restarting my life after it being torn apart by work related stress and someone who didn't care about the industry that he worked in. Oh! And I started my DnD game here in Charlotte.
2002 - sucked more. My sister got married. We flew up there and drove home. Fun, yes? Not really. Oh, and issues with child #2 were really beginning to rear their ugly head. Thankfully that's much better now. As a matter of fact, I think we're finally doing well and where we should have been years ago.
2003 - sucked even more. I was excommunicated from not one, but two UU churches in town. Business of mine torn apart and put back together, then torn apart again. One day, my birthday, I found out that my step-sister had an aneurysm, my wife was struggling to manage her diabetes... and my life was changed completely by rumors.
2004 - sucked more. Yeah, a little less suckage than the previous year. Had to move. Found a great place though! Went to NYC and LA in the same day. Then went to SUUSI for the last time (maybe not ever, I might go back... eventually). shannontabbycat was offered freedom to pursue employment opportunities elsewhere.
2005 - sucked the most. With shannontabbycat's struggles with work, my struggles with.. well... everything... it wasn't fun.
2006 - sucked. A lot of friends were around and that was wonderful. I worked at the screenprinter/embroidery shop until I couldn't anymore thanks to home life requirements. I'm being really nice here btw.
2007 - sucked also. Jaysin killed himself. That started it. Home life started to get better though. I also started working with the ad-specialty guy who does my advertising and bookkeeping. This is good.
2008 - honestly wasn't as bad if I remember right. shannontabbycat had started to work late in the previous year for her current employer and has been there ever since. Car troubles were resolved for the most part too.
2009 - sucked. Car trouble, housemate problems kind of ended, game went strong, then fell apart, only to be rebuilt. Yes, gaming is that important to me.
2010 - could have been better, but wasn't terrible. Until the end that is, when the state's Vogon department decided they were going to put a bypass through the wonderful house I was living in. August got the first news, then later had to do it and now, at the time of this writing, we still have some stuff at the old house, though we're working hard to get it out of there. The place we're in now is, honestly, a step up from the place we were in. And that's really hard to believe. Good thing - on 10-10-10 in Washington D.C., I saw Roger Waters perform "The Wall" in its entirety. Thank you iamthebrain for that! I cannot express how much that meant to me.
2011? Looks to be a better year already.
So here's to a new decade! I've got a little bit more than a half hour before the end of 2010. I believe that the new place is all a part of it, to where the newness of the year, decade and everything are tied together. Start all over and let's do it better. Even though a large portion of the people I know are sick right now - here's to starting off a year down and it improving from this point on.
One can only hope.
Housewarming party may end up happening in about a month. Still have much to move.
It's been a while. A real long time. I've not totally abandoned you LJ, not yet at least. I still read LJs from others at least once a week and still use it to communicate. I plan on using it as a blog again at some point, that is if I have time. I keep meaning to blog though and just don't get to it. Lots of changes in everything and I hope to record them here.
Where do I start? This is the last day of 2010. Fun, isn't it? I hope so. Last year a lot of people had reviewed the decade. I am that retentive and exacting that I couldn't do that. I count from 1 to 10, not from 0 to 9. So, here we are at the start of a new decade.... let's look back on the decade that is ending in just over 6 hours from the time I'm typing this. Hm... what a decade it was.
Let me set the stage here and look at the end of the last decade - the 90's. That was a cool decade, wasn't it? I started that decade off by stumbling into an industry and subsequently a career. Embroidery yo. How cool is that? Wasn't what I planned on getting into or even remotely related. Broadcast journalism/telecommunications with a focus on radio broadcasting. Public speaking kind of stuff helped me at trade shows and then giving training classes, plus the bit of computer background helped me wotking on those 286's, which I saw grow to the monsters they are now. So, changing jobs and locations, in 1998 I landed in NC. Charlotte to be specific. Last year of the last decade (soon to be two decades ago), the company I worked for moved locations to a tower in downtown (uptown?) Charlotte and I hated it. I was the last hired so I was the first to go when it all went according to plan by the boss kid (owner's son) of the company and he collapsed it in upon itself. Thankfully, shannontabbycat was working for the UU district office and so my leaving there allowed me to go into business for myself, watch my guys, run the household and not really lose any money or income that we were used to living off of from the previous ten years time or at least that amount of income that I had built up to having. Y'see, she started working and immediately was making more than I had been after ten years in the embroidery industry.
Stage set, there we were at 2000, moving to 2001. By that point I had been suckered in (exaggeration there) to working with the "yoots" as I call them at the UU church. Great stuff. Gave me a reason to exist as I really didn't have a clue how to start up or run a business. Trips to the Small Business Assocation did not help. Working with the yoots gave me a perspective on reality that I had lost. It gave me hope and I was encouraged that the future held some pretty good things as they, the yoots that is, were pretty cool people. Still in touch with a few of them today and I thank them for being and also for being so awesome. I've loved watching them turn into humans, vicariously growing up with them. Imagine that, some of them have exceeded me in that "growing up" concept.
So, 2001 comes along. Am I up for a quick recap? Sure... here we go by year...
Hmm... let's make this a brief recap, shall we? Okay...
2001 - sucked. Incidents in NYC (my sister was a block from it), incidents at the UU church (seriously? you painted over their art?), restarting my life after it being torn apart by work related stress and someone who didn't care about the industry that he worked in. Oh! And I started my DnD game here in Charlotte.
2002 - sucked more. My sister got married. We flew up there and drove home. Fun, yes? Not really. Oh, and issues with child #2 were really beginning to rear their ugly head. Thankfully that's much better now. As a matter of fact, I think we're finally doing well and where we should have been years ago.
2003 - sucked even more. I was excommunicated from not one, but two UU churches in town. Business of mine torn apart and put back together, then torn apart again. One day, my birthday, I found out that my step-sister had an aneurysm, my wife was struggling to manage her diabetes... and my life was changed completely by rumors.
2004 - sucked more. Yeah, a little less suckage than the previous year. Had to move. Found a great place though! Went to NYC and LA in the same day. Then went to SUUSI for the last time (maybe not ever, I might go back... eventually). shannontabbycat was offered freedom to pursue employment opportunities elsewhere.
2005 - sucked the most. With shannontabbycat's struggles with work, my struggles with.. well... everything... it wasn't fun.
2006 - sucked. A lot of friends were around and that was wonderful. I worked at the screenprinter/embroidery shop until I couldn't anymore thanks to home life requirements. I'm being really nice here btw.
2007 - sucked also. Jaysin killed himself. That started it. Home life started to get better though. I also started working with the ad-specialty guy who does my advertising and bookkeeping. This is good.
2008 - honestly wasn't as bad if I remember right. shannontabbycat had started to work late in the previous year for her current employer and has been there ever since. Car troubles were resolved for the most part too.
2009 - sucked. Car trouble, housemate problems kind of ended, game went strong, then fell apart, only to be rebuilt. Yes, gaming is that important to me.
2010 - could have been better, but wasn't terrible. Until the end that is, when the state's Vogon department decided they were going to put a bypass through the wonderful house I was living in. August got the first news, then later had to do it and now, at the time of this writing, we still have some stuff at the old house, though we're working hard to get it out of there. The place we're in now is, honestly, a step up from the place we were in. And that's really hard to believe. Good thing - on 10-10-10 in Washington D.C., I saw Roger Waters perform "The Wall" in its entirety. Thank you iamthebrain for that! I cannot express how much that meant to me.
2011? Looks to be a better year already.
So here's to a new decade! I've got a little bit more than a half hour before the end of 2010. I believe that the new place is all a part of it, to where the newness of the year, decade and everything are tied together. Start all over and let's do it better. Even though a large portion of the people I know are sick right now - here's to starting off a year down and it improving from this point on.
One can only hope.
Housewarming party may end up happening in about a month. Still have much to move.