The Life of a Contract Engineer: Week 4

I worked my 40 hours this week. I enjoy going to work so much. I work with a good group of people. That makes a huge difference. I am learning new software and doing computer simulations, and I like that stuff and I'm half decent at it.

Communication at work can be interesting sometimes. I had a problem this week and the fifth person I went to had the time and was actually able to solve it in 30 seconds despite the fact that we spent five minutes debating what the actual problem was. That was after approaching the first four people who could not help. Slightly amusing and rather frustrating. Educational though, it is nice to be reminded once again how critical communication is.

One of my friends works at Intel, or perhaps it's IBM. Anyway, one of the things he likes about his job is that he can point to the little icon on the front of the computer and tell a six year old that he helps make that. My job is fairly similar. I ask if people have seen those car commercials where they have  a computer model they crash. Then I tell then that I do the same thing, except on giant rectangular pieces of sheet metal. Not quite as interesting but still exciting. I get to sit at a desk and make colorful pictures all day long and socialize with a nice group of people. Colorful pictures, nice people, an engineering salary, what more could I want?

I ran 121 miles this week. That's the most I have run in one week in more than a year. I've only had four weeks in my life that I ran 120 miles or more. Included in that total was a 12.1 mile tempo at 5:58 pace, the only tempo longer than 10 miles I have ever done. I also did some short hill repeats and the usual 20 mile long run. I have also started doubling on long run days and I like that trend. On the very negative side the week ended with a possible piriformis problem or glute problem or chronic muscle tear on my right side.

Why am I possibly injured? Running at a high level requires a lot of running, to run a lot you have to do all sorts of additional work to strengthen your weaker muscles. I have been neglecting those exercises the last few weeks. Actually I have been neglecting those exercises most of 2011. I deserve to get injured. I also have not had a massage in over a year! To be a good runner you have to do A, B, and C. I am decent at doing A (running a whole lot), but I can be lazy about the B (supplementary work) and C (rest and recovery) all too often.

In other news I passed 30,000 words (70 pages in MS Word single spaced) on my book about unemployment. I also bought a domain name and started another website. I am still working on the details, but I will probably unveil it in the next 10 days. I want to do some work on Janzen Gear before I flip modes and start another tribe.

I also had a rather interesting social experience Friday night. The local FFA (Future Farmers of America) puts on a wine and cheese show every year and I went with my parents this year. I tried all sorts of wines and cheese, and I talked to a few people that were at least a little excited to talk to me. I'm going to blog about excitement to see people in the upcoming weeks. Anyway, Sargento and Sartori and a few other cheese factories are within five miles of my house and I have to say that Sartori's Aged Asiago cheese is amazing. I guess it is so rare they don't even have it on their website.

I had a good week. I hope you had a good week too. It was a week were I am not sure I "went anywhere" but I progressed in several areas that I think I might be close to making a breakthrough. Life is good.