A Kodachrome Outlook

A few days ago, I celebrated my 78th birthday by going to Cheddars Restaurant and ordering an 8oz grilled salmon, rice, baked potato, and broccoli, ate half and took the rest home for a second meal tomorrow.  We also stopped by Perkins Restaurant and purchased a whole Caramel Apple pie with Vanilla ice-cream.  While my celebration might not have meant much for most people, for me, it was perfect.

I have lived on this earth for almost 8 decades and have experienced many pros and cons about life in general; I have lived through both Democratic and Republican administrations, survived Vietnam and Woodstock, college, grad school, and 45 years of working for ASSHOLE bosses.  I was very fit and healthy until age 60, when I contracted Lymphoma, had a heart attack (3 surgeries), four years later contracted Melanoma (2 surgeries) that returned twice, radiation treatments, and three years ago had L2-L3-L4-L5-S1 disks fused due to spinal stenosis.

Half of my hair is gone, the muscular physique that I once had has been replaced by fat and I am fifteen (15) pounds heavier that my desired weight of 195.  Most of the weight is due to the steroids I took for over 12 years.  I have been eating healthy since 1987, minimal red meat, no alcohol, no cigarettes, no fried food, but fish, chicken, veal, pork chops, vegetables, and beans, with some fruit. 

MY GOAL is to live until my 96th birthday and beat my mom's longevity as she died just shy of her 96th birthday.  My dad lived until 89.

According to Meyers-Briggs, my personality on numerous occasions has always been INTJ.  The second rarest personality type.  My horoscope sign is Scorpio.  I am a builder of theoretical models and concepts and very few people understand the way I think or why I think that way.  This uncertainty has resulted in only a few friends, most of which are dead except for one, a Canadian and we still stay in touch.

Retired since 2015, I now spend my time maintaining two blogs daily and writing novels that I have no desire to publish.  Does this mean that I don't think my writing is good enough?  Maybe, but it is not what I tell myself.  I tell myself that I just enjoy the creativity of writing.  Fiction is what I write, scifi, spies, FBI, mysteries, adventure, and human interest.  I do a lot of research to make sure my points are authentic and I use CoPilot to test out plot design and other details.  So far, I am the only editor of my work.

When think back on my 45-year career (reminiscent of Paul Simon's Kodachrome), it is a wonder I survived.  I made a point of kissing no ass to keep my job and I was very careful to demonstrate I could outwork everyone.  However, I frequently had to change jobs and in one instance change states from NC to TN.

Lessons Learned:

1. Arrive early - leave late
2. Everyone can be replaced
3. Outperform your peers without cheating
4. Learn as much as you can as quick as you can
5. Always be looking for another/better job
6. Take copious notes, especially at meetings
7. Try to make the boss look good not matter how bad that hurts
8. Treat subordinates like you want to be treated
9. Be fair, honest, and never lie
10. Be the glue that holds the team together