zator

...is change.

My immediate boss, our application development director, has decided to step down from his post. He will be here in IT, just not as our boss, and will report directly to the CIO, just as he did as a director. Moments after his out of the blue shocking email, the CIO sent an email about how he had found a replacement for our director and that he would be starting Dec 1st.

Needless to say, despite my comments of wanting to move up into more of a manager position, I was not asked to apply, or consulted about who may be a good fit. This angered me. I am more or less over it now, but there are still some nagging issues that have yet to be resolved.

There is some wondering about whether director stepped down voluntarily or if it was one of a rather unpleasant set of alternatives given to him by our CIO. The lack of wanting to talk about it is leaning my own personal perspective to the latter. Our CIO has a somewhat disturbing habit of being a very political creature - which is a nice way of saying he can put on many faces depending on who he needs to reassure. I really cannot trust him to look out for the interests of our development team. And I am not the only one. I know of three developers who are now actively interviewing with other outfits. With the budget crisis, if they leave, those positions might be closed as part of the cuts. And we are understaffed as it is.

Not to mention the new director is from CIO's past. He has two directors from his past - one over network, the other over the PM office - that he has installed, and they have been less than effective at their jobs, and even less effective at promoting good will to those around them, being advocates for end-users and their ridiculous and unreasonable demands rather than the needs of the people that are underneath them. I am concerned that director #3 will follow the same example. Again, another reason why people are looking elsewhere. It was bad enough when we had an advocate. I don't want to contemplate what it will be like if new director will follow suit.

I have no plans to go anywhere - yet. I haven't programmed any installable applications since I have been here. I have worked on web applications, but I don't believe I am an expert web developer at this time. And the market is crazy competitive right now. Things are not desperate enough for me to go winging off into the private sector, let alone taking a contract job. The issues that one knows are better than the issues that one fears, and I have a family to think about. I also am, in all honesty, not ready to become a real boss person. So, my impulse is to stay, learn all I can, make myself more marketable, and then see where things stand. After all, I think among all the change, I will be here for as long as I want to be.

But the future does look bleak. There are unpleasant days ahead...

age
41. Old. period.

location
Lacey, Washington, USA. A suburb of Olympia, WA, which is the capital city of WA State just off the southern tip of Puget Sound in the Pacific Northwest USA. Washington the state - not Washington, D.C.

occupation
Software developer. I essentially maintain a host of web applications that need almost as much care and feeding as the users that use those applications.

partner?
Married, and loving ever minute of it. In high school, I was a wall flower - I did whatever I could to avoid anyone's attention. But yet I had numerous crushes and infatuations with many of my fellow students. All I ever wanted was to belong to someone, and I vowed that if anyone ever gave me a chance, I would never let her regret it. 19 years married now, and despite some pretty horrific mistakes on my part, she has stayed with me. I am grateful for her and her influence in my life, and I can't imagine living my life with anyone else. Thank you, Sweetie!

kids
We have 5 daughters. I love them to death. I am a little scared of boy children - I never know how to play with them. Girls are great, though. Kids are great. There is nothing like them to keep you grounded and secure.

brothers/sisters
I have 1 real brother. He lives in eastern Washington state. I grew up with several half brothers from previous marriages of my parents. I even had a couple of brothers that I didn't meet until I was grown up. No sisters that I know of.

pets
1 dog, a boxer/american bulldog mix named 'Tater. Three cats - Shadow, Serenity, and Simon. A Gecko named Stevie. We keep trying with lizards - someday they will work out.

list the 3 biggest things going on in your life
1. Family
2. Work
3. Choir

parents
My father passed away when I was 11. I miss him a lot, even to this day. I would have turned out quite differently if he would have lived. My mom lives with my little brother on his property. We are not the closest of families.

closest friends
Besides family, right? I have many friends, I don't know how close any of them are, though. I have no best friend other than my wife. Maybe that is the way it should be...?

I am not sure where this post is coming from. Just some random thoughts, I guess, and your mileage may vary.

A friend of mine, who is Catholic, and for whom I have tons of respect, and I have spoke a few times regarding "praying for the dead", which is a concept that is a little interesting and different to me. To refresh my memory, I looked here for the idea and concept of praying for the dead. I guess the idea is, and please correct me if I am wrong, while souls are in purgatory, they suffer purgatorial pain (whatever that might be) and that prayers and alms and other things on their behalf by the faithful living eases those pains. The link above remarks only on those who are penitent, and they suffer the pains if they have passed away before they have made satisfaction of their sins by penance.

So I wonder about those that are NOT penitent when they die. Are their pains more pronounced? Do they even go to purgatory? Or is there some other place for them? What of them who are not Catholic?

In contrast, the LDS point of view specifies a Spirit World, where all the souls of them who have passed on go to. The Spirit World is divided into two parts - Spirit Paradise, and Spirit Prison. These names are somewhat confusing, because those in Paradise teach those that are in Prison. So, in a sense, those that were faithful here on the earth go on to teach those who were never taught, for whatever reason, here on earth about the gospel. In the Spirit World, all still have their free agency, and can choose to accept or reject the gospel. Not all is revealed, so faith still plays a strong part in learning. Part of the problem with this is that it is much harder to school ones body to the yearnings of the spirit if the spirit and body are still separated. I suppose there could be pain and anguish upon learning and accepting the gospel in the spirit world that those spirits in prison might regret their deeds and missed opportunities. I also think that this may true for those in paradise as well - at least to a certain degree.

So I guess that when Latter-Day Saints pray for the dead, we pray that they will accept the gospel. If they had already accepted the gospel, we pray that they will be able to perform their calling to the best of their ability. For those that have not accepted the gospel on this earth, in time we can perform those gospel ordinances that they did not participate in while on the earth for them, under certain circumstances. Also, the idea of death to LDS is not such a dark one, but it is just merely the next transition. While the death of a loved one opens a void in our lives and hearts, that sorrow is mixed with the idea that a loving Father in Heaven has a plan for them, and we hope and pray that they will follow that plan. If they don't, then they don't. I am sure the Celestial Kingdom will be full of many families that have members missing from their ranks because of their choices.

So I guess I just wanted to compare and contrast. There is a lot I don't understand about the Catholic faith, and I am not trying to say which is right or wrong - you readers can decide that. I was just thinking these things, and didn't know how to pull them out.

I do pray for India, Thom, and all of you who have been touched by the events surrounding her death.

...and I have about 3 pounds of yummy candy in a bag to eat through over the course of the next several weeks.

Trunk or treat was great. The kids went dressed in kimonos that my wife had sewn together. They had chopsticks in the hair and looked beautiful. I need pictures of them to post.

Some family from out of town rounded out the weekend quite well.

To be honest, no, I don't believe in a soul mate. I think certain couples might have met in a pre-mortal existence, and were friends, but I think we had lots of friends before we came here.

I believe that, if you take two decent, honest people, put them together, and if both of them struggle to carve a live out for each other together, those two people are going to succeed in whatever relationship they form - friends, lovers, husband and wife, co-workers, whatever.

I am married to a fantastic woman that teaches me what true love is every day - or at least as close as our human bodies can come to it. She will deny it, but everything she does is completely selfless. She puts the people in her life, particularly me and our children, continually first before she considers herself. Yes, she has her selfish moments, but they generally get put away before too much time passes. She has also developed the quality to say no. People who love like she does generally get abused and taken for granted, and she has gotten pretty good at knowing where the line is between "samaritan" and "floor mat".

Her original post is here. Please read her post first.

I wanted to reply, but my reply was really long, so I didn't want to clutter up her message with mine, but I felt I needed to respond. Here it is:

I like how this is just a cut and dried issue for so many people. That the people who are against legalizing gay marriage dont use logic or rationale behind their thoughts and ideas. They are dead set in their old fuddy-duddy ways, and are ultra conservative, and just plain dont think about others thoughts and feelings, that by denying people this right, they are causing hurting and suffering.

You probably know I am one of those who would vote against legalization of gay marriage. But not for any of the ideas that you mention above.

To me, being gay *is* natural. Some people are born to it, just like some people are born to be over weight, or addicted to alcohol; like some people who are more nurturing and loving, and others are more hateful; like some people are autistic or have down syndrome, and some people have no mental problems at all! The list is endless - we all have our gifts and our weaknesses - and depending who you talk to, whether those things are gifts or weaknesses is up to debate.

But just because someone is given to natural tendencies, should they follow through with those tendencies? Should a person who is a pedophile abuse children? Should a person who is an alcoholic drink? Should a person who is prone to obesity eat excessively? Should a person who is mentally handicapped not try to rise above their illness as much as they can? Or should all these people use their gifts as an excuse for the way they act, or an excuse for extenuating circumstances, or as an argument for their legal rights?

Somehow this got turned into an argument of what a person *is* instead of what a person *should be*. What a person *can do* as opposed of what they *should* do. Part of the reason for this, I think, is that the problems inherent in a society with a substantial population of actively homosexual people is really not known. Most are content to let people do what they want behind closed doors - how does that hurt me? Guess what - the problems inherent in a society with a substantial population who actively drink wasnt known back in the 60s and 70s, where a vast majority of Americans had a wet bar in their home, and the first thing husband did upon coming home was fix a drink - or have his wife fix one for him. While we have come a way since then, there are still pockets where this is still causing a problem. Children are still being born today being addicted to alcohol before they even breathe on their own.

I know, in my heart of hearts, that acting on a homosexual impulse is wrong. I would never do it. Many people out there would never do it, either. It goes against something deep in our conscience. Like the first time a person steals a candy bar in a store - they know instinctively that it is wrong. Their heart rate goes up, their palms get sweaty, they are nervous and jumpy, and perhaps a little excited; this is because they know what they are doing is wrong. But they do it, and get away with it, and the next time they aren't so nervous, and if they keep doing it they lose that feeling of wrongness. In fact, they like that high that comes with it. Romanticize and legitimize all you want, shoplifting is wrong. I think that if people out there were really honest with themselves, they feel the same way about homosexual activity. They know its wrong - for them. But what right do they have to impose that on others?

I believe it is all of our right, and even our obligation, to stand up for what we think is right. Is it natural to want sex? Yes, of course - but we have restraints about with who and where and when. Those restraints are already breaking down before us - premarital sex and affairs are rampant. And yes, they are causing our society problems. I believe allowing those restraints to come down even more will cause still more problems. We may argue and debate what those problems are, but when it comes down to it, I believe in them. So I have to fight for what I think is right. I have to fight because I believe that we can rise above our impulses, and that if we manage to rise above them, society will be a better place. Not just sexual impulses, but all of the natural impulses that are part of being a human being. If we as a global society are able to master our natural tendencies, can you not agree we would be much better off?

Just remember that all of us fighting against legalization of homosexual marriage are not illogical. Some of us think, and feel, and wish this issue never had to come up. We wish we could stand behind something that obviously so many people want. We wish they didn't have to live with this pain. But it isn't us causing the pain and suffering. Everyone has a choice how they want to live their life, and more often than not, it's the choices that *we* make that bring us suffering, not the choices of others. It is a right to choose how you want to live - but there are consequences for those choices. We may not have a choice about what we are, but we have a choice about how we let who we are influence our actions.

...on facebook that a friend of mine posted about. That friend voted in the poll to remove the words "under God" from the Pledge of Allegiance.

I sent her this private note, but I wanted to post it here as well, and get feedback. It's been a while since I posted something controversial anyways, so here goes...

I know we don't see eye to eye on this, and I don't want to argue with you, but it wasn't Eisenhower's idea. Louis A. Bowman came up with adding the words "under God". He got those words from the Gettysburg Address given by Abraham Lincoln. He was given an award for the idea by the Daughters of the American Revolution. It was in use for decades by different groups of people until Rev. George Docherty gave a sermon while Eisenhower was in attendance at his service. He compared the US to the ancient city Sparta, and said that Sparta's strength didn't lie in it's physical defenses but rather the spirit of its people. He made the correlation that the strength of the US lay not in it's might, particularly back in '54 of its nuclear arsenal, but rather in the spirit of the people. The spirit that Abraham Lincoln spoke to.

While you may not believe that God is behind America's strength of old, there are many of us who do. As our country draws farther away from Deity, whatever form you may think Deity takes, it weakens our country. Abraham Lincoln believed that, Bowman believed it, Docherty believed it, Eisenhower believed it, and so do many who voted, both back then and apparently even now, according to the poll you posted.

However, I know you will believe what you will...that George W Bush is the reason our country is in the turmoil that it is in, and perhaps many other theories. Never once will it enter your mind that as America loses (or changes, if you prefer - its all the same) its sense of what is morally right and wrong, we will sink lower and lower, our might will weaken, and eventually we will be overtaken. Believe what you will, let the winds of the world spin and sway your conscience. Believe in the wisdom of man. But if this country does decide to do what you propose - turn its back on God - then nothing can save us. Particularly not the wisdom of man. I prefer to put my trust in something that is a little more, um, eternal.

Let the lambasting commence! :)

Back from my week long vacation. I stayed with Tabitha, Perri and Zoe while Aerika and Tally went to girls camp - and Mom went with them.

As many of you know, it was excruciatingly hot last week. Kinda nice to be in AC again today.

Got a sunburn on my shoulders that was bad enough to make me ill for a couple of days. Played with the girls some. Mostly just tried to stay cool.

Eve Online sent me their yearly "reactivate your account for a free week, and you get the next month play time for 10 bucks" email, so I played Eve some as well. It is slow and boring, but very pretty. I can usually only take so much Eve before I crack.

I find it interesting - Eve gives you lots of time to think - that I play these games. Role playing games in general. The game is hard, so you put x amount of work into it to make it easier, then you advance to more difficult stages, so you put in more work, etc. I wonder how much better my life would be if I improved my real life instead of those of my characters...

I was watching a Star Trek:Next Generation episode last night. The name of the episode was 'Reunion'. It's the one where Picard mediates the ascension of the next Klingon leader, and Worf is introduced to his son.

Well, at the end of the episode is a kinda touching moment between Worf and Alexander, his son. The episode ended in a sad, kinda lonely note as Worf's love (and Alexanders mother) has passed away, and father and son cling to each other. The last chord in the background music was a very lonely sounding chord - neither major or minor. So I listened to it a few times, and figured out that it was an open fifth! I have never recognized an open fifth before, and it was quite the revelation. I wonder how many other open fifths I have missed in my life without knowing they were there

I am thinking I will just let it revert. Who needs all these icons anyway. I only have like 6 or 7.

And I dont post much any more anyway. I read a lot, I just dont post much.

Friday, we went over to a neighbors house - they just moved in, and are members of the church as well. They have a few girls, younger than ours, but are very excited to make lots of new friends.

Saturday was Perri's baptism. Perri wanted a BBQ for dinner, so we were going to do that, but with everyone going in different directions on Saturday, we decided to hold off on it until Sunday. The baptism was wonderful, naturally, although we missed a lot of extended family, and wished they were there.

In sacrament meeting on Sunday, happygarden gave a talk about teaching your children, which essentially she stressed about for most of the week, but she did really well on it. We woke up to a thunderstorm, which is pretty novel here - we just don't get them too often. As the rain disappeared by the evening, we had the BBQ, that that was very good.

So yeah, it was busy...but fun!

Another flakey night last night. It started out okay - did some BBQ, tried to work on my hard drive some more (to no avail).

We have been waiting for some money to come. happygarden watches a child for respite care, and essentially watches her for 80 hours a month, but with the economy, the government scaled back the respite hours, so she is only getting paid for 25. Well, the check is 2 weeks late - 400 bucks that we were counting on getting, and living like we were going to get.

So that is a disappointment, and slowly our debt has been getting out of hand. Most of this is due to my flying - one of the reasons I have stopped. So we have ourselves in a hole again.

Well...this caused another meltdown last night. Thats about all I want to say, I guess.

For all of you out there laboring under the false assumption that I am a good husband and father - I am not. In fact, I am quite tired of people telling me that I am doing a good job when I really am not. I am quite tired of life at the moment.

This is just a vent. I have no one to talk to about any of these things. Hopefully, just getting it out in the opent will help.

My boss asked me to be the contact person for weekend work in case the people upstairs needed something done. There was no problem with this - actually, as far as that went, it went beautifully. They called to have some stuff moved to production to be ready by this morning. I have had the ability to move stuff to production for some time, being as how I am a lead. Well, I moved the stuff, and one of the devs checked it out to make sure all was peachy. It was. Well, later that day, I got challenged on why the person who is supposed to be moving stuff to production wasn't notified to do it and why I did it instead. It was a big misunderstanding, and in the end he agreed that it was a good thing to do. But why challenge me over something so trivial? So, that set me off a little...I expect this kind of communication issue on business users, not fellow IT people.

Then, our 160GB hard drive no longer is functioning. I have known it was on its last legs for a long time, but I never did anything to move the data off. We have a lot of little kid pictures on there, as well as most of our MP3s, tax records, and a bunch of other stuff. I had ample opportunity to take care of it and move it off - I never did. Now, BIOS wont even detect the presence of the drive. I am pretty sure the data on it is okay. So, happygarden got frustrated with me a little, but the worst part is I ended up feeling pretty lousy about myself. Lousy that I got angry about the work stuff, and lousy that I didn't get the stuff moved off, lousy about money issues, lousy about not doing the stuff I should be doing for my family like scripture and prayer every day, even lousy about my new calling...it turned out to be quite the lousy fathers day. Not that I deserved a good one, so it is probably just as well.

So, my logical side is telling me to stop being a slacker, and start attending to these things. But at the moment I am so down, I am having a hard time doing it. Feeling down is very seductive at the moment, and it makes me feel even worse that I am giving in to it.

A Dear Prudie letter from Slate - click here for the article.

The young lady, promising to keep herself chaste until marriage, decides that it is harmless to read "clean" romance novels to satisfy the natural urges of a 23 year old female. Note that she mentions there is no explicit sexual content. However, she now fantasizes about bare chested men thrusting her against a wall and showing her the ways of the world. And the poor guys that she *does* meet in the real world are judged according to that standard, and she doesn't want to date any of them. Her friends are concerned that she is becoming obsessed with these novels and that they are distorting her view of reality as well as her views of men.

I would like to know a little more about this promise of chastity she has made with herself - just how far will the promise let her go? And is masturbation allowed or disallowed through this promise?

I have always known that pornography tends to distort our views of reality, but there has always been discussions about what is "safe" or "clean", and how that it is perceived as harmless. Can materials that don't explicitly go into sexual intercourse acts but does allude to them be considered safe? My thoughts go almost immediately to some conversations I have had with young people about the Twilight series.

In particular, I want to discuss the impact of these materials on young people - teenagers or single adults still looking for romance in real life. I mean, this young lady has made a very important decision early on, and I congratulate her for it. But now she is struggling - she admits to not wanting to go out with guys because they don't measure up to her fantasies. Obviously she wants to live a clean life - did she make a mistake by allowing the novels into her life, or should she have defined things a little bit better about how she wants to live her life?

It kinda goes back to what I talked about before - if your goal is, for example, not to get pregnant in high school, you can certainly make a promise of no sex, and keeping that promise will meet that goal. If you slip on your promise though, the bets are off. However, if the bar is raised even higher - don't date the same young man more than twice, or no going steady, or no single dating til sixteen - your goal is almost assuredly met - and you might even live a happier life knowing that a lot of stress is out of your life. So if you slip, and fall in love, your goal is still safe.

So, are these materials safe? Could they have the potential to impact lives? I think they can. What scares me is that one of my daughters friends is reading Twilight, and she started out a little boy crazy. Where Aerika is still thinking (at least openly) that boys are "stinky", her friend talks about boys that are hot, and fantasizes about vampire boyfriends. One major difference is that Aerika is the oldest child in the house - her friend is the youngest, and has had older sisters date guys, so she has had that exposure as well. But do these materials, including novels, TV, movies, etc. also have an impact? How safe are they?

How safe is it to go into the gray areas?

The song is Captain Wedderburn, done here by Great Big Sea. It is an old folk song where the titular character meets a fair maiden and wants to bed her, but the maiden says he must answer 6 questions first:

What is rounder than a ring?
What is higher than the trees?
What is worse that a woman's curse?
What is deeper than the sea?
Which bird sings first?
Which one's best?
Where does the first dew fall?

The maiden talks about 6 questions, but there is actually 7, and he answers 7.

Just odd, I guess. Maybe they couldn't count back then...? Listen to the song and count them yourself...

...the last day of seminary.

-sighs-

A short excerpt from the memoirs of Peter G. Perterson.

I wish I knew more billionaires. Just the idea of knowing that all your cares are taken care of so you can devote your time and thinking to helping others.

Of course, maybe the lesson is knowing when we have enough?

...since I posted. I have had lots of stuff going on.

The seminary year is almost over - in fact, I have 3 more lessons to teach over the course of the next 5 days. I have a feeling the last day will be a wash, and will have lots to do with scripture chases and perhaps even some food - the kids want pizza! I am not sure what that will entail.

Seminary will then be over after this week. It has been a great year, and I have learned a TON of stuff about the New Testament. I was also looking forward to teaching the Book of Mormon next year, but it seems that the Lord has other things in store for me.

I have been called and was set apart today as the new first counselor in the Elder's Quorum Presidency for the Lacey II ward, Lacey, WA stake. So far I have lots of questions, but I am sure they will be answered in time. I am not sure what my specific duties will be, nor do I know how much of a workload it will be. This probably means I will not get to teach seminary next year, but I don't know yet as seminary in particular and CES (Church Educational System) in general are just a little bit different. I will probably find out more as the week progresses.

We will be in my first presidency meeting on Tuesday evening. I will probably learn some of my duties then. Like when I was called to be a seminary teacher nearly a year ago, I feel very inadequate and very sad that I leave behind a wonderful calling where I have grown so much. Having a calling that *makes* you study the scriptures every day is actually pretty easy and fun once you get used to it.

I know this is where the Lord wants me to be. I have faith that this is just my next step on the journey. I will have to find more and better ways to be more loving and kind to those I am serving. May I live so that I can be given the strength to magnify this calling.

The article.

I guess Donald Trump owns the pageant, so he has the final say. It's awesome to know he is taking his responsibility seriously.

Of course, Miss Prejean was the runner up in the Miss USA pageant after giving an honest answer to a difficult question. Later, it was revealed that she had participated in a photo shoot where her eligibility for the pageant was compromised.

After Trump and associates "reviewed the pictures very carefully", he decided that some of the pictures were beautiful, some were risque; but then she is a model. The pictures were judged to be acceptable and fine.

Is it just me, or does anyone else conjure up some images of these meetings where these pictures were the topic of discussion? Can you honestly think there was a serious and objective discussion going on there when they "reviewed the pictures very carefully"?

Had a great weekend for the most part. happygarden spend all of Saturday out playing with all the plants she got and hanging out with her flower beds. I spent some time Guild Wars-ing, and that was kinda fun. Aerika (eldest daughter) and I went to see Star Trek in IMAX, and that was a LOT of fun. We both enjoyed the movie. Saturday night, we had hamburgers and watched Secret Garden from Netflix. It was quite a bit slower than Star Trek. :)

Sunday was Mom's day. I didn't call my mom. I am a bad son. We did church, and they gave all the moms chocolate. We came home, read some Hobbit out loud to the family (the chapter was "Barrels out of Bond"), had a nice dinner. Happygarden and Aerika got really concerned about one of our kitties being missing all day long, but he came back at night, so all was happy again.

I hope you all had a fantastic moms day!