Merry Christmas

Merry Christmas!  

Abandoned Thoughts

I was going to write several different things.  I realized they were all whiny, disconsolate answers of people blaming the world for their problems.  They were the thoughts of losers, and the thoughts of losers need to be plunged and scrubbed from our minds as quickly as possible.  The facts are facts.

1) I am expected to perform at work. 

2) No one cares what I think.

3) It is not my boss' job or responsibility to make me rich.

4) I am responsible for my own destiny. 

5) If I am mad at my destiny, then I am mad at my own choices.

6) I need to change my choices in order to succeed.

7) The choices I make must lead to action.

8) Those actions must lead me where I desire to go.

9) Before I can get anywhere, I need to figure out where I want to go.

So...  the facts are laid out, as best as possible.  I think Tom Stanley's The Millionaire Next Door pointed out that 80% of millionaires are first generation rich.  That means, to paraphrase Dave Ramsey, they started with nothing, did the right thing, and became rich.

Now why do I want to be rich?  Because if I am rich, then I can work when I want to work, and I can work on what I want to work on without having to worry about keeping the lights on and food in my stomach.  Instead of spending my spare time working on my desires, I can spend all my time working on my desires.  I'd much rather spend my time on what I want to rather than what I have to make a buck and put food on the table.  But that requires discipline to drag myself out of the laziness and apathy that surround the world and surround life.  It means dragging yourself out of what average life says and reinforcing your world with a different truth.

I'm not mad at marketing, but it pervades and eats at us.  I don't smoke cigars.  But working at an inbound call center that took orders for cigars forty hours a week made me think about cigars.  I didn't even take those calls.  I was stuck on PBS and some farm animal thing.  But the pervasiveness of what I listened to and what happened around me changed my thinking and made me change my behavior. 

The problem with me is that I've listened to the wrong people for too long, and I've got to beat those wrong thoughts out of my head, one thought and action at a time. 

The best example.

For all the effort I've been putting into describing what I've learned, a Cracked author narrowed it down to six truths. 

I would recommend everyone read this.  Because it's awesome.  And because this is the epitome of what I've been trying to espouse.  Both personally, financially, and pretty much everything else.  But it took a professional writer to go out and put it to paper well enough for it to get to the point of YES! 

It's an excitement that just can't be contained once you finally see someone point out the simple facts.  And it's strange, because everything David Wong, the author, discusses is biblical truth.  He even said so himself on page 2. 

So stop griping about what your life could be, and go create!  Create something FOR SOMEONE ELSE and not just for your consumption.  Create something because creating is worth the worth is.  Go out and create.  Because as people, that's what drives us and forces us. 

So get off your couch, quit being a damn slob, and take charge of your life.  

Quit whining about what you'd "like" to do and go out and do it.  

It's. Just. That. Simple.

Diamond Age

I've been thinking of The Diamond Age and at this point, I think technology has almost caught up to what Neal Stephenson envisioned.  I keep imagining how I'm going to create A Young Students Illustrated Primer as a download off the Google Android App Store.  I think the technology is there.  No, not for an exact copy.  But for a non-living, second half of the book, army of little girls copy.  I can understand why it hasn't been created.  But... it would be totally awesome if someone would.

I flipped through some of the Ubuntu options for education.  GCompris came to mind, but it just wasn't what I was looking for.  It's all games based a different approach.  With GCompris, someone else teaches the subject.  Then GCompris takes over and helps with enforcing the concept through games.  It doesn't do a good job of replacing the teacher.  And that's what I want to do.

Sorry unions, but the teacher has got to go.  And the technology is probably there.  But is there a will and a desire?  Because we're talking something beyond complex.  About breaking concepts down into teachable, repeatable sections where if you can't do what is going on, then you can't move on.  No pass, no advancement.   But like a real teacher, the program has to be able to teach the same subject in dozens of different ways to finally get the point across.   

I think my major desire is because I don't believe the US school system is worth a damn.  I grew up in the public school system.  I found it completely lacking.  The public school system teaches to the middle.  If you are exceptional in either direction in any subject, you get left behind and chewed apart.  I can't complain about class size, because mine were no more than 30 in any class.  I grew up with the same 30 or so people.  I was 9th of a class of 32?  38?  Somewhere in there.  

But I made it through without major effort.  I had problems that became huge during college.  Because I was on both ends.  English was a joke.  By eighth grade, I had learned everything they had to teach me.  But math... that was a different story.  I wish I was better at math.  But I wasn't.  I barely passed.  It crippled me.  

But because I had small class sizes...  they passed me.  And they crippled me.  Algebra didn't seem important, and my teachers wouldn't put in the effort.  Now, I wish they had.  Because what I love to do requires math.  Because math is a universal truth.  And English is open to interpretation.  

And now you get where the failing is.  Or maybe you do.  

English: many interpretations.  None is absolutely correct.  

Math: One interpretation.  One answer.  

If the education system refuses to accept there is one correct answer, then they will teach to failure.  

 

So....

Remote access.  It's something I think I've begun to love more and more.  Sitting where ever I happen to be, I can login to certain computers, and get them to do things I normally wouldn't be able to do.  See, normally I'd have to have VPN access.  But then with decent remote software, I can be sitting up on a ladder, working on one project when the phone goes off.  Person B needs a problem solved, and like 5 minutes ago because some device quit working.  And I can connect to them remotely and fix it if it can be done remotely. 

It makes me think the future showed up a lot faster than anyone ever expected.  Somewhere in the process of learning is to learn Linux.  I only have spare computers at work, and spare time at home.  Not really spare...  just a tendency to make time.  So I can use remote access to connect to my Ubuntu machine in the office while I hang out on my couch, and play with things from there that would normally require VPN access. 

Makes me think, though...  Linux is such a nice open platform, and I have no idea how to write much code in it.  I don't know much of anything about it.  Hence the remote access to force me to figure out how to make certain things work.  Small steps towards getting a decent network monitor written and operational, and turning this Ubuntu machine into a full featured remote administration machine. 

That's the entire point...  remote administration and monitoring so instead of being reactive to threats and problems I can be proactive.  But it's hard to be proactive to stupid. 

The right thing, at the right time

From the vagueness of what I last left you with to something specific. It's hard to quantify what I've learned in the military, and even harder to explain it to people who have never been in the military.  I've run into lots of people who thought they could fake it...  but when it comes down to it, you just can't compare.

My brother-in-law lit himself on fire.  It wasn't intentional.  Someone was cleaning at his job with pure alcohol and he lit a blowtorch and up he went.  He works in the oil business, but I couldn't tell you what he did.  But the training he went through as a firefighter stopped him from serious injury. 

Now...  what if you could hire people that do things instinctively...   without thinking...  and it's the right thing?  You'd probably make a pretty penny or two.  And that's what's good about military people.  They do the right things in a pinch.  Because that's what they've been trained to do.  The right thing.  Without thinking.  Every time. 

When the incorrect response results in death, then you lean the correct response quickly.  I knew one fat fuck during my 2nd tour in Iraq.  His name was pronounced Gregwar.  Except that it wasn't Greg War.  It was Greg waour.  Or something like that.  It didn't sound like a badass in the middle of a war.  It sounded like a chain smoking fat man with French heritage and a gut that said he was 9 months pregnant.  And that guy got shipped off to war.  He was shipped home early. 

If Gregwar had been just incompetent, I could have worked with that.  But he was a lying sack of shit.  And lying is something I just can't stand.  If you are stupid, I can deal with that.  Ignorant?  That's workable.  Untrainable?  I can deal with that as well.  But a liar?  That's hard.  Actually, it's not.  I just didn't have the authority or ability at that time. 

The point of mentioning Gregwar is to show what happens if you retain incompetence.  But what about the person that does the right thing, at the right time, every time, without being prompted?  Firefighter training saved my brother-in-law.  Because he did the right thing.  At the right time.  Without being prompted.  And it saved his life.