Oh, hello! You’re still here?

As you can see, I’m posting more frequently again following an extended absence off enjoying family events and travelling and the planning of both. Being away for mostly that entire period, I rediscovered how much I prefer off-line pursuits. Yes, the Internet is a wonderful, sometimes magical place, but learning how to balance online and offline activities has always been a challenge for me. I tend to dive into things and it takes me a while to come back to center; sometimes this process can take a long time and this latest and much-needed away time has been a terrific “reset” button. This isn’t to say that I ditched the Internet, just that outside of my working life  I have greatly reduced my online activity.

In preparation for my vacation I turned down all the digital background noise to a minimum as much as possible. I unsubscribed or dropped to weekly digests a number of online newsletters I regularly follow (only two have made it back so far), stopped forwarding nonessential emails from my other email accounts to my phone and uninstalled phone apps that were diverting my attention. And that’s still pretty much the situation today. Less distraction and more focus.

But seriously, Facebook, you are teh devil.

(If you need a “reset” button, feel free to grab mine.)

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivs 3.0 Unported License.)

From our house…

Better shared!

Moving right along at full tilt

Or is it tilt-a-whirl?

Trying hard not to think about all the things that still need doing before our Passover holiday in little over a week’s time. Things have become a bit more complicated while I deal with recovering from another bout of pneumonia (the 2nd in two months) and a third round of antibiotics. Everything leaves me breathless. Thankfully, I have two sisters-in-law to lean on for cooking (and a strange feeling to not be including my mother-in-law (z”l) in that sentence), though the festive meal is at our house. I’ll be leaning on my sons and husband for the post-meal cleanup, which takes almost as long as the cooking and preparation.

Also weighing heavily on our minds as we go into the week before Passover holiday is the current situation in the south, which picked up considerable speed this weekend. Since early Friday morning, at least 75 rocket and missile attacks have been launched from Gaza, including an anti-tank missile that was fired on a school bus, mortally wounding a 16 year-old student. Who knows how many more rocket attacks before this post is published Sunday morning Israel time.

Meanwhile, Mr. Haniyeh has asked that Israel stop retaliating, to which I can only reply, “Chad Gadya.”

Updated: seems I’m not alone in my thoughts on the latter subject. The Wifely Person Speaks. Go listen.

Better shared!

Happy New Year

May the coming year be one of joy, peace, health and prosperity.

(I’m releasing this card under a Creative Commons BY-NC-SA 3.0 license. If you would like to send this card, please feel free to click on the photo to go to flickr or download a PDF version, available until Sept. 19. )

Previous posts about the Jewish New Year: 5768, 5769, 5770

Two Scoops and a Dollop of Karma

Flashback to late 2009: After several months of again being unemployed, my husband suddenly lands two job interviews. During the first interview he is asked how old he is (“Logan’s Rerun” anyone?) and whether he’s capable of working 12-hour days (which made us laugh since that’s the norm in hi-tech management). The second interviewer seems genuinely interested in his skill set since they are looking for someone to bring their current product (!) up to UL compliance and lead product development.

To make a short story even shorter, after starting to work for the second company he discovers fairly quickly that all the important cards are held by the person from whom the company took away responsibility for product development. Ouch. Things go from bad to worse and then, a phone call and job offer… from the Company that let him go seven years ago.

Friends tell us, “Be happy that he’s returning to the Company”. I am infinitely thankful that my hubby is again employed and in a place where many faces are familiar. But after living out of the proverbial suitcase for the past seven years, I admit to being a bit wary. In this particular circumstance there is a good chance we’re looking at yet another layover on the road to somewhere else.

In a comment I left on my earlier post, “Logan’s Rerun”, I mentioned that I’ve reinvented myself job-wise so many times that I occasionally have to check my ID card to make sure I’m me. But then again, I’ve never had a “career” (other than a broad service-oriented one). I think reinventing oneself is infinitely harder for someone who has invested their heart and soul on working in the field from which they graduated and in which they worked for most of their adult life since then.

Gaping Void, by Hugh MacLeod and released by him under a CC BY-NC-ND 3.0 License

(Make sure to read the comments on Gaping Void for more perspective from another over-50′er trying to get a grip on a changing world.)

There’s no doubt that in such an employment environment as this, one has to be creative not just in day-to-day problem solving, but also in one’s approach to life. I’ll let you know how it goes.

Editor’s note: The above image is from Hugh MacLeod’s website @ http://gapingvoid.com/2010/07/03/the-only-way-to-keep-your-job-nowadays-is-to-constantly-re-invent-it/ Unfortunately, due to the PicApp image on the front page of this blog, the link to Hugh’s original post has been taken over by PicApp. This behavior doesn’t appear in the single post.