I managed to go an entire calendar month without a post. Admittedly, I've been swamped for the past month, and I've had no time to even consider posting. Even now, my time is limited, so this will be a short post, I think.
I think I mentioned in a previous post that my employer for the past decade or so was in trouble. We closed our doors on February 2nd. I had been searching seriously for a job for the past year and to be honest, was wondering if I'd ever find another job at the same level I'd been at.
I had been interviewing since early December with a local healthcare IT company. But, the process just kept dragging out and I wasn't sure if I'd ever get an offer. However, on the afternoon of 2/2, my last day at my old job, I got a verbal offer from this new company, and I'm now wrapping up my 3rd week as the Director of Technology for the new company. It's an interesting job compared to previous positions I've held.
I really have no hands-on technical work as part of my job. I'm truly a Director, with employees to manage, contracts to negotiate, and customers to satisfy. Being a step removed from the technical work is a change for me, but I'm adapting. Stuff that I would do on my own in the past I'm now supposed to assign to others. But, it's working. The new job is challenging - no doubt about that. The organization has had some recent turmoil and lots of turnover. My staff is young and two people are still very much in a learning phase, along with me. I'm still down a person due to recent turnover, so I'll likely be hiring someone in the near future as well.
The biggest parts of the job seem to be managing vendor contracts and customer relationships. This is stuff that I enjoy doing, so I think the job is going to work out well in the end, although my learning curve remains steep.
I took a week off between my old job and my new job, and my son and I did a road trip to TN to pick up a new Rhodesian Ridgeback puppy. Her name is Ruby and she is just the sweetest puppy I could have imagined. The biggest issue we've had is that our older dog isn't fond of the puppy and her lack of social skills, so their relationship remains tenuous. But, it seems to get better day by day. We discovered yesterday that if each of them has a new marrow bone to chew on, they get so focused on the bone that they have no time to growl or bark at each other.
Ski season continues to limp along. At the beginning of the Presidents' Day holiday week, Sugarbush was 100% open and the skiing was amazing. And then, it got warm. In one week, we lost a lot of snow and every natural snow trail is now closed. This past week has been warm again, and although it's snowing lightly now, it won't be enough to replace what we've lost this week.
Two weekends ago, I took a hard fall while working and broke my thumb on some advanced terrain. So, I'm now navigating the Workman's Compensation system, as I need surgery on my thumb to reconnect the UCL to my thumb. I'm scheduled for surgery a week from Monday.
I hope the surgery doesn't get delayed. The recovery time is about six weeks, and my surgery will be 4.5 weeks before trout season opens. It's my right thumb that's messed up, and I need it healthy to cast on opening weekend. Plus, I need it healthy to get back to lifting consistently.
I've been able to do some CrossFit since I hurt the thumb, but between the new job, tiredness caused by my cancer medication, and the injury, it's been easy to just take some days off. I really need to get back to the gym at least 3x per week. The last two weeks, it's been 2x, and that's just not enough time to stay fit.
The working part of ski season will be over in 16 days. Well, I'll have to write performance reviews after that day, but I won't be working on skis any more. Most seasons, I'd use the next month after work to get in some free skiing with my wife, but my thumb may dictate some changes to those plans for this year.
Hopefully, the surgery will happen as scheduled and I'll have a speedy recovery and get back to skiing and fishing very quickly.
That's pretty much it. New job. New puppy. Broken thumb. I guess I could have used this last line as my whole post.
