New Digs

    2022 has been a year, already of upheaval. This also includes the reassignment of my professional life.

    After sixteen years, during which I studied and credentialed in a specialized field. I am moving across to another tract to see out my working life. I am hoping that the return to less combative late night telephone conversations and a regular schedule will allow for the completion of the major project, which, must be completed.

How To Work From Home in a Pandemic

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  Across the United States, employees are being told to "work from home" as an attempt to stem the flow of the Corona Virus, CoVid-19. As people do so, they are some techniques that can be employed to ensure that you actually accomplish "work" while at home.

GET DRESSED
  You wouldn't report to workplace in your pajamas, nor should you report to your home work station in the same clothes you slept in. While you may not exercise the same dress standard as the work place, getting dressed is a psychological tool to differentiate between being at work, and working from home.

HAVE A PLACE TO WORK
  Even if you have to clear a spot at the dinning room table, have a dedicated work station. Sturdy chair, flat surface, lighting and ventilation are the hallmarks of establishing the invisible boundary from home and work. Coaches, beds, and floor space are not work stations.

KEEP A SCHEDULE
  Your mind functions better if it maintains a schedule of events. If you are an office worker with office hours, maintain that schedule while you work from home. Your employer will still need to reach you, your co workers will need to collaborate with you and your subordinates will still need to report to you. While you may no longer have to clock in and clock out to the minute, don't be the guy who misses the video conference because you weren't "at work".

MINIMIZE DISTRACTIONS
  This is, in my opinion, the most important. The access to you by other family members may be taken for granted, or that movie you haven't seen may be starting in ten minutes. When you are "working from home" you're no longer available to attend to the domestic chores or ask, and a television should never be on in your work space. It is too tempting to be distracted b the comforts of the home when you should be working.

EXERCISE
  In the workplace, you walk between offices, the lunchroom, maybe tour the facility in order to get your steps in, or to stretch out from your work station. Maintain this approach and ensure that during your "work day". that you try to maintain the same level of physical activity. Walk the dog, leave the car in the garage if you have to go outside, but make allowances that let you continue to exercise. Long hours sitting at your desk and hen flopping into bed is counter productive.

   There's a method to how I work from home. I maintain the same schedule: rise, breakfast dress and report to my work station prior to 7am. Email are no more than 15 minutes as it's too easy to be distracted. I break for lunch at noon every day and return about 30 minutes later. Around 1.30pm I get up and walk the dogs, come hail, rain or shine. Returning about 2pm, I check emails one more time and write till about 4.30pm. There is no television near my work station, although I have a CD player I occasionally put on low volume.

  Jacob, the cat, is my sole co worker at home, and I often engage in workplace conversations with him. Though working from home can be a solitary assignment, there is no reason why you have to be "alone".

A Gut Wrenching Week

  It has been, a gut wrenching week for me.

  First, news arrived from home of the jailing of the most influential teacher in my life.  Father Michael Endicott was jailed this week for historical offenses against children while he was teaching at Villanova College, Brisbane, during the late 1970's and the 1980's.

  The only victim to be named alleges that the priest took photographs of him after swimming training. The victim, beat me out of a place on the swimming team when we were competing against each other.

  Elsewhere, I write that the priest had brought thousands of boys from Darkness To Light, myself included. I cannot imagine the mindset for these matters.

  The second, comes from across New Zealand, where a gunman opened fire on a mosque killing 50 people. Terrorism, is not based on skin color or religion, but the acts upon which it is performed. There is no difference between the New Zealand incident, and the shooting of school children. There is no place in the world for terrorism.

  The second incident is disturbing as I was scheduled to complete my Terrorism training last November, when i was involved in a motor vehicle accident the day prior to the training. Had I completed that training, I may not be sitting here waiting out another year to cycle through to complete the studies, which, would have opened up access to a line, or what I call, the W2 employment.

  Between those two events and the demons that live in my sleep, you would be surprised how little writitng has been done.

  However, there has been a revision of a major work, where one of my characters was based upon the most influential teacher of my life.

Eye Will See You

Friends, Family and Followers,

  The last 45 stitches have been removed and the results are:

 - I get to keep my eye sight.
 - I do not need reconstructive surgery.

  A legacy of the Australian lifestyle, I am grateful to Suzi for vigilance of "the small dot" on my face, and to daughter Jillian, who while I was away at dad's, was the voice of reason to her mother when the prognosis came.

  For the Limelifers, starting One Drop Wonder means "eye will see you" in Denver

Not All Bad

Not all bad things have evolved from this period.

Yesterday I was able to submit a feature article, the first such submission in almost three years. Why?

For the past three years I have been gainfully employed in an industry that pays for a forty hour week and demands a hundred hour week. Between the Southern California commute and sleeping, I can examine almost every aspect of my life that has been vanquished for the industry. It is not wonder now that my body is sleeping more, recovering from the damage that has been exerted.

That doesn't pay the bills though.

Not out of the woods yet.

I'll get there after I have a nap. 

I'm Gonna Need a Bigger Boat

Houston, we have a problem.

Nothing as dramatic as the O2 panel exploding off the outer skin en route to the moon.

Nothing as devastating as Cyclone Tracy on Christmas Eve.

Proportionally, just as devastating.

My writing laptop took 25 minutes to boot up today and another 7 minutes to open a browser window.

I'm gonna need a bigger boat.

Or a new laptop.

18 January 1990

18 years on.

"Bravo 910, would you proceed to the Wool Store please.  Alarm sounding."

It was another long night at another fire.

Still photograph at 1 minute 39 seconds, Police Command Post.

What I Do, What I Write

Next week, I travel interstate for a conference which pertains to my "day job". While it is no secret about what I do - a quick search of Google will show that - there is very little writing about my work.

Conversely, twenty years ago, I was in an environment which now has numerous appearances in a variety of genres - self help, family, motivation and science fiction. How is that I was able to turn a career into profitable works?

I wrote about work.

The New York Times in 2014 wrote that "just being a novelist is a lot harder than it looks". Never has this been more apparent when people inevitable ask me what I do to support my writing. Again, it's no secret, but what I actually do - well, that needs to stay on the 'down low'.

This week I started working on a piece of speculative fiction and several thousand words in, I recognized that had I been sitting at a Starbucks writing, (as most writers seem to be identified as commencing there) any Tom, Dick or terrorist in the area would have been able to see "what I actually do".

Delete.

Our Nations Security, is far more important, than anything that I might write in the imaginative world of the Saturn Sector.

Disaster Management - Just Another Day at The Office

I'd like to thank the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) for all their exception training.Without their help, today's disaster could have been much worst.

Sunday morning and I had just settled down to watch the Nascar race. The green flag had just waved when this blood curling scream erupted from the other end of the house.  Daughter #3 came a running.

"There's a mouse in my room."

Normally such exclamations do not phase me, however,  Daughter #3 followed it up with "It's a disaster, I don't know what to do."

Disaster? Emergency Management? Incident Command? This, is what I train for.

Daughter #3 debriefed me on the situation. "I'm not equipped to handle this."

So much for the Preparedness cycle, we'll move straight into response.

"I'm sorry sweetie I cannot help you until you expend all your own resources attempting to get the mouse out." No sense breaching any procedure today.

Minutes later she returned claiming to have cleared a path for me. Having received the "Emergency Declaration", I moved in.

The place looked like a bombshell had hit. First of all I couldn't see the floor let alone the mouse - I was going to need some Resources - probably a Type III cat. Jasper Kitty was first of the Cat Corps to arrive. Debris management went into place as Jasper begun his Search and Destroy mission.

"I'm out of here," Daughter #3 stated. "I can't sleep in here tonight with a mouse running around."

Good - self evacuation, saves me issuing a mandatory evacuation order. "You shelter in place on the couch while we continue with the Response Phase."

The mouse was located but the debris was too excessive - drink bottles, empty Cheetos, how many shoes does this girl have - I was going to need another Resource, something a little stronger. I'm going to need a Type 1 cat, and in came Jacob. Just in time too, I had to release Jasper on Safety Grounds when he started to show signs of Stockholm Syndrome towards the mouse.

Jacob wasted no time and had the mouse cornered.

"Don't hurt it," Daughter #3 said, peeking through the door from the edge of the disaster perimeter.I swore under my breath, I'd forgotten about Animal In Disaster.

Within hours, I had the mouse worn out, cornered, and captured. Removed from the Disaster Zone, and I was now into Recovery, returning all the bedroom equipment back to it's original position.

"No," Daughter #3 cried. "All my shoes go back under the dresser."

"Not any more," I said throwing them into the cupboard. "Mitigation."

Had to be my own CERT team as well, sending out and paying for own pizza once the job was down. And Papa's Johns still messed up my order.

Disaster Management - it can turn your Sunday into Another Day at The Office.