Diary of a Network Geek

Well, not much of an update today, but I thought I’d add in some personal stuff. Just for variety.
Last weekend, the girls went out to a Celtic Fest and left me at home. I thought it would be nice for them to get some “girl time” together. Anne has been working really hard and hasn’t been able to see Allie as much as she’d like, so I thought it would be a good opportunity for them to “bond”. This weekend Anne isn’t feeling too well, so I might just end up taking Allie out shopping for a little while. We need to get a book on telling time for her. I’ve instituted a work-for-allowance program that requires some knowledge of telling time. (Okay, so what I’ve done is tell her that I’ll pay her $2.50 per hour of cleaning up and other chores that she does. She might as well get used to the idea young. It is how the world works, after all.) Besides, I also need to get a book on the current version of Red Hat Linux. After looking around the Internet at stuff, it seems like everything for Linux of any real value assumes that you have a version of Red Hat installed. So, in spite of the fact that I’ve been enjoying Storm Linux, I’ll be learning Red Hat.
Speaking of learning… One of the reasons that I’m focusing more on Linux is that my studying for my CCNA (Cisco Certified Network Associate, for the uninitiated) has been slow going indeed. I’m still working on it, but with the lack of sleep that house guests create, it’s been hard to slog through the issues relating to sub-networking. It’s especially bad since I’m already familiar with most of the material! I just have to get the Cisco methods down for the test. Shoot! I’ve been doing TCP/IP since Novell used IP tunneling!! (That’s over 8 years, incidentally.)
Anyway, this is going to be a light weekend. At least, it is if I have anything to say about it. I’m in a good mood since I got two calls from headhunters on Friday. They’re looking to fill Network Manager positions, which is what I think I need to have next. I changed my resume on Monster.Com to reflect the fact that I managed people for the past two years. It seems to have made a difference! So, like I said, I’m in a pretty good mood this morning, so, if Anne is feeling up to it, I may just take my two girls out to our favorite little Greek place for lunch, Niko Niko’s.

See you next week!

Not much going on this week, so I might as well have an update! Anne’s sister has been with us for a couple of days and I’ll be taking her to the airport later this afternoon. In spite of some setbacks, it looks like she’ll be doing the move to Pittsburgh just fine. She’s a little worried about the whole thing, but so was I when I moved down to Houston. I think she’ll be okay, once she starts to adjust to living in a new state. I’m not sure that her parents will adjust, but that’s a different story.

Speaking of different stories… I activated a second resume on Monster.Com yesterday that has more of a focus on management than my other one. It’s gotten about 25 “views” so far, but I’ve already had two calls. I’m not sure that either of them will pan out, but at least someone’s showing interest. One of the things that might have been slowing folks down was that I had mistakenly left March as my out date. Yikes! I wonder how many people passed me over thinking that I hadn’t found a job in four months!! Or, almost as bad, that I’d already found a job and wasn’t really looking anymore. Well, at least I’ve corrected that problem.
On a related note, since I’m taking Nancy to the airport, I won’t get out to the “job fair” at WIZARD. I called J. to tell him, but I had to leave a message. I haven’t heard back from him, so I can’t help but wonder if he’s wise to me. Or is that, that he knows I’m wise to him? Cheap, shady tactics result in cheap, shady jobs. And, that’s all I have to say about that.
Speaking of not getting a call back… I haven’t heard from D. at the Waco Syndicate, so I called her this morning. Unfortunately, I had to leave a message there, too. I really wish I could get more information on the job she had dangling before me. Or, if it’s passed me by, I’d like to know that, too. *sigh* Ah, well, it’s a bit of a waiting game. I figure that if I haven’t found something permanent by the end of the month, and we don’t get extended again, I’ll just start contracting. In fact, that’s what I’ve saved my other Monster.Com resume for, contracting. I reworked it with a contracting slant to it. At least I have some kind of fallback position. Thank God I’m in an industry that lends itself to that.

Well, it’s been a while since I put in an update, so hold on to your hats! A lot has happened in the past two weeks.

First off, I went back to Binder and made my sales presentation. It actually went quite well, in spite of the fact that I was very nervous. I didn’t sleep for two nights before the day of the presentation I was so nervous. But, I know I did okay, because they made me an offer. In fact, they made me a nice offer. The base salary was a 9% increase over my current salary, and with the “sales incentives” it would have been a 39% increase! Yikes! But, I had to turn that job down. Sounds crazy, doesn’t it? Well, I just didn’t think that either Anne or I could quite cope with the 75% plus travel that I would have to be doing. And, I just wasn’t sure that this was the direction that I wanted to take my career. But, I have to admit, I’m going to be thinking about that decision for a long time.
One of the many reasons that I thought the travel would be too much for us both is that Anne would be almost totally alone. Her sister, who she’s very close to these days, is getting a divorce and moving to Pittsburgh, of all places. It seems she found her first fiancee, whom she was ready to marry at 18, and they’re getting back together. It seems her parents didn’t approve at the time, but now she’s old enough to make that choice for herself. I say, good for her! After all, I moved down to Houston from Chicago two years ago, and things have worked out pretty darn well for me. Well, except for the whole job search thing… She’ll be coming back this week for a couple of days to stay with us. She has a few things to wrap up before moving up to Pittsburgh pretty much for good. She’ll come back down to get her stuff into a U-Haul and take it back up in a month or two. I wonder how that will effect how Anne’s mother talks to her?
Well, sorry for that departure into Way Too Much Personal Information Land, but it’s a pretty good example of how personal stuff effects the job search.

On other fronts, I’ve been talking to D. at the WacoSyndicate about that management job. She expected to get the job description last week. I haven’t heard from her yet, but she still seemed positive about the whole thing, so I hope I will this week. (D. if you’re reading this, I have my cell phone with me most of the day!)
I never did hear back from T. at DÜT about their position. I suspect that it was because there wasn’t a position at all. I found the exact same job description on Monster.com and I applied there. Also, I think DÜT is part of the WIZARD “family” of companies. And I’m growing more and more disenchanted with them as time goes on.
Which brings me to J. from WIZARD… He wanted me to come to a “job fair” to look at positions they need to fill. Mind, he didn’t have any in particular that he wanted to show me, but he suggested that there might be one that he “missed” that I would like to do. To be honest, after having someone there not return my calls, having another person tell me that I was making too much money for my skill set, and then not having any real jobs that fit me (i.e. no management positions), I really don’t think I’ll be able to make their “job fair”. Also, Anne has worked with the WIZARD people before, so I know that their “job fair” is a list of jobs that they need to fill taped to the wall in their office. Wow. Sounds like the big time, hunh? Luckily, I gave them the excuse that I was going to have houseguests again this week, so I might not be able to make it. Nothing like thinking on your feet, eh?
On yet another front, someone I used to work with at Harbor has found a job at a financial firm. She called last week to tell me that they’re looking for Network staff, so I sent my resume over to her. Her boss, a Vice President walked it over to both HR and to IS, so hopefully, I’ll hear something from them soon.

Well, until something breaks, I’m still pounding the digital pavement. If anyone reading this has a Network Management position, y’all let me know! Anything for a medium to small sized company would be great. I can run a help desk, too, so a position that combines both would work.