The New Year's posts

I'm kind of wondering where to take this blog in the new year. By definition it's supposed to be about the stresses brought on by job changes, and the at least parallel (if not intersecting) paths of unease that come with this stage of life we euphemistically call middle-age.

(Didn't this time of life used to be considered old age not too many generations ago? You know, like back when people died of consumption and the gout. I think there's an underlying inflation rate in longevity that is messing with our lives' relative purchasing power in terms of time.  A year isn't worth what it once was.  Darned improvements in medicine! Getting old ain't what it used to be, either. It used to be... getting dead before getting senile. Now it's the other way 'round.)

As I was saying... the raison d'être of the blog, the career thing, is sort of in a holding pattern right now. I do have a new boss, yes, and I suppose that could be a source of stress, but since I work from home and he is some 400 miles away...

Plus, the career change thing is going nowhere fast. Or maybe it's actually going somewhere, but just reaaaaally slooooow.

At the risk of being woefully off-topic in general, then, I think it will be more like an on-line diary here for a while, with random impressions and musings, than a detailing of career-related stresses. And honestly, that's pretty much what it has been for a while.

So, okay, then. Just a quickie for now about how New Year's Eve & Day went, and then maybe later something deeper about life, love, and faith.

We know from past experience that it takes 2 full years in a new community before you start locking in on relationships deeply, especially as couples. For us, it's been ... 19 months.  So as a result, there's no real "friend group" yet to hang out with on NYE.  A year hence, that will probably change.  

Instead, we did a private "movie marathon" and loaded up on pizza.  :)  The movies we saw were "Miss Pettigrew Lives For A Day" (Frances McDermott), "The Name Of The Rose" (Sean Connery, Christian Slater, F. Murray Abraham), and "Be Kind, Rewind" (Jack Black, Mos Def), plus filling in the edges with the complete Lord Of The Rings trilogy, and of course ringing the bell at midnight (see prior post.)  Fun!

The rest of the time I spent cleaning up my basement winemaking area, unpacking tool boxes for my workbench in the garage, and rebuilding my iTunes playlists (still not done with that.  Grrr... they didn't tell me that when you change hard drive locations for your iTunes library that you have to reimport all your music, and that all your old links and playlists are useless!)  :(  

So you know, nothing you really want to spend time on, but need to.  Oh yeah, and having a year-end wrap-up session over coffee with friend SQ, taking inventory of our respective gains and losses in 2008 in the life categories of career, finances, interests, family, and relationships.  That I wanted to do.  :)

Today... more progress on my recreational reading stack, maybe an indie movie, picking up my new turntable with the USB port and analog-to-digital conversion software, and then tonight we're off to a dinner party at which I will break open a 20-year old bottle of Rubissow-Sargent Cabernet Sauvignon.  Hope it hasn't turned!  Which is why I have to bring along a dessert wine, too, just in case.  Not to mention the homemade blackberry/pineapple sherbet I whipped up (literally; even licked the beaters...) for the occasion.  :)  Huzzah!  Extended celebrating!