Performance Reviews

Need to start writing FY04 performance reviews....I hate doing these..I've got 12 to do and they're due by Dec. 17th. For whatever reason, they've pushed the due dates up so now we have less time to get them done. I've blocked out all day today to work on them. Unfortunately, I'm feeling sick...woke up yesterday morning w/ a sore throat and have been feeling worse since then. May try to play some texas hold 'em tonight....we'll see how I feel.

The Terminal work is not good right now...one of my key folks has been out alot and the future stuff is a mess. I need to reorganize that piece and I've lost time. I'm frustrated with some of the folks since they don't seem to care too much about the work. Trying to work my way through it...

Tomorrow is turkey day with Meg and Lauren...that should be fun. I hope I feel better. Also, ran 3 miles on Tuesday, time 25:47...about an 8:36 pace...8 seconds faster than last time but I was feeling it.

Sunday night

Watching "touching the void" on WETA. Its a little different from the DVD, they have some additional voiceovers but not too much. Got the car washed today and it looks pretty good when its clean. Its running fine too so I have a hard time justifying getting a new car. Looked at my finances too and I'm better off waiting a few months before buying so I'm thinking I'll get the Forrester in March or April. No hurry either way.

Went to watch Michigan and Illinois play yesterday but the bars were really crowded, Erin, Drew, and I tried three different bars before we ended up staying at Mr. Days. Left just after halftime since we were standing.

Saw Julius today to observe a visitation. He looks great and is walking around alot- he just wanted to explore. It was a good visit and L seems to be doing well. Also went to the gym and ran three miles and worked the legs. Total time: 25:55....thinking about running another marathon in May w/ Erin. She convinced me to shoot for an 8:45 pace with a marathon time of 3:45 hrs....thats a full 1:30 faster pace and 45 minutes shorter than what I ran in SF (10:15/4:30 hrs). I think it can be done....I figure I can take 15 minutes off right away because of the SF hills so then I just need to shave another half hour. Yeah right, we'll see......

Risk-taking

Kind of a long read but interesting:

http://cms.psychologytoday.com/articles/pto-19941101-000027.html

It talks about that climber I mentioned in the blog below. I like this quote:

Maddi suggests that well-adjusted people are "good at turning everyday experience into something interesting. My guess is that the safecracker or the mountain climber can't do that as well. They have to do something exciting to get a sense of vitality. It's the only way they have of getting away from the sense that life sucks.

Well-adjusted people? Thats harsh. So according to this, if I wasn't climbing I'd be addicted to drugs, gambling....Hmmmmm.....strangely enough I have noticed my "need" to go to Vegas at least twice a year has dropped since I've started climbing. Also going to learn snowboarding this winter. After reading "touching the void", now I want to try mountaineering. I'm sensing a pattern. We'll see.

Sunday Morning

Bailed on the hike w/ E and SJ. Felt bad but just wasn't feeling it. Ended up heading to a party w/ the climbing group. We dranks some beers and watched "climber porn" which was just some climbing videos. Hilarious. One of the videos showed this solo climber who would go up some 600 feet 5.11s. Insane. Well he died on a solo climb in '93. I wonder what he was thinking while he was falling......that really bothers me.

Going to do some climbing today at GF w/ Neal. Looking forward to that. Cleaned the condo yesterday (instead of Veterans day). Hmmmmm......watching CNN and just found that the tax dedcution for giving your car to charity is going to change after Dec. 31. In '05 you can only deduct what it actually sold for not what the blue book value is. I may accelerate my plans to get a new car. BTW- I've decided to buy a Subaru Forrester. Its in between an SUV/typical car and gets decent gas mileage. I talked to a women at Starbucks yesterday who had one and she said she loved it.

Spent some more money this week on a sleeping bag/pad and also ordered some more books from Amazon.com.

Day off for Veterans Day

Almost done with "Touching the Void". I can't understand how he had the resolve to keep going, its beyond me. Have some time off today for veterans day. Heres some of the things I'd like to get done- clean condo, clean car, climb. Lets see how the day goes. Overall, not pleased with the way things are going right now. Trying not to be too hard on myself but need to do something to keep things moving.

Finally had VN provide some architectures and meeting w/ FAA on friday to review. We'll see how that goes. Still uncomfortable with me leading this work but trying to work through it. I think the WV civil war is finally ending, such drama. I need to talk to AM and CL to close this out.

A good quote from the climbing group:

Struggle all day with what you love doing, and you're just tired.
Struggle 5 minutes with something you don't like, and you're overworked.

Right on...

Braces

December 20th......thats the day the braces are coming off. The ortho did a CR (check for removal) today, made some adjustments, and said next time they're outta here. Sweet! I wanted them off before Thanksgiving but this will work.

Had a good weekend. Drove out to Coopers Rock on Saturday for some bouldering, not too sure how I feel about that. We were going up some pretty high boulders and it was unnerving to be that high w/o a rope. Sunday did some climbing at Sugarloaf Mountain. That is a great area w/ good rock and some beautiful views. Scraped up my arms and legs pretty good, interested to see what the doc. will say on Wed. for my physical.

Work was so-so, ATO roadmap stuff and WV meeting which I ended up skipping out early on anyway for the ortho.