Kid Chess debut

I went "out in the field" yesterday to participate in the school "meet and greets" to sign up kids for the Kid Chess "Fun With Chess" after-school programs that I will be an instructor in. The pic are from a group of photos I took with my cellphone camera while at Vaughan Elementary School in Powder Springs, GA (Cobb County). This was the presentation...on the right is the Kid Chess sign, demonstration board used as part of intruction and the actual after-school Kid Chess program flyers; in the center are four chessboards, and on the left was my laptop looping a Kid Chess instructional video. I unexpectedly got brownie points from the LEDs on my laptop cooling pad! It brought the kids over like moths to a flame! Ratana (Kid Chess Operations Manager) was impressed that I had so many new signups! Not that I did anything special, as these programs ultimately fill up anyway. But since I am one of the "new guys", I guess I did better than expected! It was stressful but fun!

Now, the actual instruction part of things doesn't begin until after Labor Day, and I have some additional training to be given in the meantime. And I have no idea what schools I will be at yet...so stay tuned!

Regards

Doh!

Due to my extended sabbatical from the world-at-large, I have been woefully out-of-touch with a great many people that mean a lot to me.

To all of you, please accept my heartfelt apologies and please know that an email, letter, phone call and/or drop-on-your-doorstep is way overdue and will be coming very soon!

Part 5 - "Special Delivery"

Part 5

Special Delivery!

Well, the latest (and possibly) greatest news I have to tell is this: it's a good thing that
the job situation is gelling together right now, because Bridget and I have just found out that
she is pregnant again! Yep! We are expecting another baby, probably in the spring of 2007.
That will put the new baby and Rowen about three years apart, give or take a few weeks. This is still somewhat "jumping the gun" as she has yet to see her doctor, but the pregnancy test
screamed "positive" this morning, and she has had physical symptoms similar to the early
symptoms she experienced while pregnant with both Royce and Rowen. No, no morning sickness yet. Too early. We are both very excited and also scared...we were not intending to have another baby at this time given our financial situation, and the need to move to a bigger place eventually just got more important! Cross your fingers that this pregnancy will be a better
experience and a better outcome than the previous two! The statistical odds are in our favour
that the baby will not be born with PHHI like Royce and Rowen did. Remember, it is an autosomal recessive trait and there is a 1 in 4 chance in any pregnancy we have that the baby will be born with it...since both babies so far had it, we are hoping that statistics will be on out side this time. But even if this baby has PHHI, the pregnancy will have been closely monitored like Rowen's was and we all know what the worst-case scenario is (Rowen) and what to do. So we are OK with all that. I am personally rooting for having a girl this time (one of each, a boy and a girl, would be nice)...however, I have heard that after having two boys (Royce and Rowen) in a row greatly increases the likelihood that it will be another boy. In the end, it really doesn't
matter. I am just thrilled that we are expecting another baby, as I always wanted to have more
than one child.

So, I have a new job (hopefully two new jobs, really) and a new baby on the way...all in all an
exciting 2006 so far!

Again, please stay tuned on developments as they come!

I'm glad to be back in the Land of the Living again...!

Regards

Part 4 - "In Search Of..."

Part 4

In Search Of...

To help make ends meet, Bridget had to teach a session of summer school, which she had not
wanted to do at all. My mother thankfully helped us out throughout the summer to stay afloat.
I have such a strong technology background, especially with helpdesk/tech support experience.
Having the job in Cartersville, a mere 30-odd minutes away from home, was a blessing. However, the vast majority of such jobs are in the Metro Atlanta area, and I was not looking forward to a grueling commute during rush hour. As it was, so many jobs that I appeared to be
otherwise-qualified for in the field also required that I be bilingual and speak English and Spanish, so I was instantly not qualified.

I finally had to break down and pick up a night shift job at the local Kmart, doing night
stocking, etc. This would bring some money in while still allowing me to have my days for
interviews that might come my way. I had a few, but nothing had panned out. I was expanding my search beyond the tech fields as well.

My mother told me about an article she had found online at MSN about retirees staying in the
workforce by working from home as agents in what was known as "virtual call centers". Although I was not a retiree, I was more than qualified for the types of work involved and have set about working from this capacity. I have so far met the entrance requirements for a company that uses independent contractors that are individually incorporated as their agents, but I now have to work out the process of getting incorporated, finish their training programme, and get on with one of their client companies before I can start making money. I would earn as little as $10 an hour, but according to the company the average agent earns about $14 an hour. I am hoping that my experience will translate my pay rate to be at or even above the average. The best part about this kind of work is that I can do it from home with my own equipment (some additions and modifications are required, but nothing I can't handle), and that the hours I work are flexible. Even working a forty hour work week would gross me more money than I was making with my previous employer, too! As it is, it looks like I will only be averaging about twenty hours a week anyway, due to another (part-time) opportunity. Stay tuned for further developments with this.

I had talked at length with Justin Morrison of Kid Chess a couple of years ago about coming on
board as a chess instructor, but the instructors, although very well-payed, worked only on a
part-time basis. We were not able to work something out at the time. In June, the thought
finally had occurred to me that I should rethink my focus of not utilizing Kid Chess as a second
(part-time) job, but make it my main job and find other work AROUND Kid Chess. I contacted
Justin and was delighted to find out that he was still interested in me coming aboard! In the
intervening two years, they had expanded a bit closer to home as well, making the commute a bit less of a hassle. My work hours with Kid Chess would be at schools in the afternoons and
after-school programs, so I might get caught with afternoon rush hour traffic, but not all the
time. And no morning rush hour to deal with at all! There are also chess camps run by Kid Chess in the summer that I will be paid to be part of. Between Kid Chess and the virtual call center and the amount of money I would gross from the combined part-time jobs, I would have full-time hours that are flexible and I would make considerably more than I had been making with my previous employer!

I will begin to work for Kid Chess proper sometime next week, with some training required before instruction in the schools begin after Labor Day weekend.

I am not giving up the Kmart job just yet. I have, however, greatly reduced my hours there with school starting for Bridget and the fact I might be working a "day job" any time now. I will
probably work there as long as I can stand it just to have a few extra dollars in my pocket, not
to mention that I get an employee discount there! ;-)

But the biggest news is yet to come! More on that in Part 5!

Part 3 - "Let's Get Physical"

Part 3

Let's Get Physical

Right as the job termination thing occurred, Bridget and I made the investment in a personal
trainer that worked with our chiropractor. I myself was at a record-high 280 lbs in the
hospital, with the majority of it in my belly area. This is definately not good. Despite the
expense, this had so-far been paying off. Even though we have not lost that much weight overall as of yet, we have, based upon our measurements in June, lost body mass in all the right places
and gained in all the right places, so this indicated that fat was converting to muscle, which
is more dense. So we were at least going in the right direction! I personally found a taste for the stationary excercise bike, and can now go about ten miles nonstop at an average speed of
13-14 mph without laboring, indicating that the excersise is having a positive effect on my
cardiovascular system. I have progressed so quickly that my trainer wants me to ride the Silver Comet bike trail with him. I am personally very motivated to do this, but will need a better
bicycle to really make it a workout, and I just don't have the money yet. That and I want to
ride the trail when it is a bit cooler outside, so perhaps sometime in the autumn. As it is, I
am really looking to getting into road cycling as a means to get a regular daily workout. Some
people jog, some swim, some just lift weights. I want to ride a bike!
So, as it stands now, we have been trying to eat better on top of the excercise and workouts to
help speed up our weight loss. My new goal is to lose an average of five pounds a month over
the next year to lose a total of 50-60 lbs, bringing me to about 220-230 lbs.



Thanks to my mother helping us out financially this summer, I have new glasses. If you recall,
my old pair broke last year, and I really needed to have something besides my contact lenses all
the time. I think that they look contemporary enough without looking too trendy, and hopefully
might take a few years off of my appearance!

What about my job search, you ask? I will cover that in Part 4. Stay tuned!

Part 2 - "...and Out..."

Part 2

...and Out

I was already on thin ice with my employer due to past issues with tardiness. I will not make
any excuses about any of that, as it was my fault, but I had taken the needed corrective action
to make sure that it was no longer an issue...and my time in the hospital was documented as
medically-excused time off. However, I ended up with a number of "unexused absences" in short order right after my release from the hospital/return to work due to what happened with Bridget, et al.

Somebody "higher-up" at work wanted me gone and had all the ammunition they needed to
finish me off. My co-workers and immediate supervisors were aware of what was going on with me and were being (thankfully) lenient given the circumstances, but there was a crackdown at work coming and I was to be made an example. To make a long story short, I was terminated due to "excessive tardiness and absences"...they actually lumped it all together into one big
classification as a violation of company policy! This just goes to show how things can be
twisted to be shown in a different light than what actually happened to suit the needs of
whomever is doing the twisting! As I mentioned before, I will not make excuses about the
earlier tardiness, but that had nothing to do with the current situation, and I was basically
railroaded out of my job.

In hindsight, that might have been a good thing. I was getting increasingly frustrated at work,
as I was passed over twice for a "promotion" of sorts (heading a new department that I had
already been involved in the creation of, etc., which, by the way, control was given to a
complete outsider that knew nothing about what we were doing that was then my direct supervisor until I agreed to shift departments...two other supervisors had my back...thanks Susan and Barry!) despite having excellent job performance ratings up to that point. Perhaps the tardiness thing rearing its ugly head against me...I will never know.

So, here it was now the beginning of March, 2006 and I was suddenly unemployed and with no
savings to speak of. We were not going to survive long on just Bridget's income alone.

To be continued in Part 3.

Part 1 - "Down..."

Part 1

Down...

By the end of January of this year, I had already not been blogging for over three months...it was just too much to handle at the time. I was about ready to resume regularly blogging when I found myself in a situation that required me to be hospitalized. That's right, I was in the hospital for a potentially life-threatening condition that (thankfully) was "headed off at the pass" before anything severe happened. Basically it was a very aggressive type of infection in my left leg (yes, the same leg/foot that I had cellulitis in back in August 2005) that required IV antibiotics for a week, hence the time spent in the hospital (see the attached picture to see just how ugly it was). I was required to take oral antibiotics for another 10 days after I was released from the hospital.

The day after I got released, my wife Bridget had a major episode with her back and was basically an invalid for three days. My mother had just gone home after helping out while I was hospitalized, and I found myself caring for both my ailing wife and our two year old son Rowen at the same time! Needless to say, since I was clearly not 100 percent myself yet, that this was not a picnic! I could have taken more time off from work per the doctor, but I insisted that I needed to get back after more than two weeks out, and now this happened!

What about my job, you ask? That is a story in itself! Check out Part 2.

I HAVE RETURNED!!!

I'm Baaaaaack!!!

What a long, strange trip 2006 has been so far! After a long absence from cyberspace, I have returned!

So much has transpired that I will have to give you all the "Reader's Digest Condensed Version", just touching on the highlights and saving the details for later. This will probably end up as a multi-part entry, so please pay attention and follow along!