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So I'm finally leaving the state for the first time since this whole pandemic began. Woo. Hoo.

I had to get special authorization from someone only a couple of steps removed from the chancellor, because all of IT is supposed to be on a vacation blackout from mid-May through mid-August. I knew it was coming, because we've had this July 1 major go-live planned for 3 years. Actually, it was planned for last July, but due to exceptional amounts of mis-management, it took another entire year. But like I said, I saw this coming, and asked for permission to take a summer vacation back in November of last year. No one even understood why I was asking. I said I wanted the approval on the books prior to leadership declaring the blackout. Oddly enough, it was my request that prompted them to even give it a thought. I finally got approval in February, on the condition that I took my laptop with me, and that I waited as long after 7/1 as possible. Well, with Nicole moving in to her dorm on 8/8, and us wanting to be gone for two weeks, here we are.

And it is a total dumpster fire. Today, I spent 4 hours in meetings with 20 people, in order to do enough knowledge transfer to enough people so that they could at least pretend like they were going to not call me with problems. 20 people, to cover one person. And that's always been the issue. 20 years of working in the same place, and they've never tried to cover for me before now. A person becomes responsible for a lot of different stuff in 20 years. But it's not just covering for me that's the problem, it's covering for me while I'm still actively fighting about 12 different fires. Today's meetings weren't simple briefings - it as a handoff of a fireman's hose.

So tomorrow Nicole and I, along with Nicole's BFF, will fly to Orlando. We'll rent a car, and spend 3 nights at Disneyworld, before embarking on a Gulf Coast road trip. We'll do a couple nights in Gulf Shores, a couple nights in New Orleans, and a couple nights in Waco, with a few overnight drive breaks in-between to reduce the amount of driving I'm doing any one day. Past reserving which Disney parks we want to go to, and making sure we're going to have beds every night for two weeks, we have no plans. It's just a pure mother-daughter-bestie road trip. I'm excited for the change of scenery, but a bit anxious about being the only driver (the 17 and 18yo won't be allowed to drive the rental). I have been on a 26.2 mile sprint the last two years, and I've probably never needed a vacation more desperately in my entire life.

Wish me luck, and I'll see y'all in two weeks! (unless I decide to check in periodically while the girls are otherwise occupied)

Safe travels!! Have fun, make lots of memories, and screw the job for two weeks!

Have fun and be safe. Enjoy every minute and remember, it’s the chaotic stuff you end up remembering and eventually laughing about (someday).

You should have enough photos to keep you busy for a couple years! Have fun!

Have fun, and while you're having fun conveniently forget to charge your phone. Been there, done that.

Hope everything goes to plan and you all have a great time!

Have fun, and take lots of pictures.

Thanks everyone. We're back, and Nicole has moved out. So that trip really was the end of an era, and the kick-off to a whole new adventure for my first born. She figured out how to put together a photo share with all of her photos and mine, and her friends' photos, so between the three of us, there are a gazillion pics, and I will definitely have lots of scrapping to do once I decide to tackle this trip.

The only bad part is that I'm back to work and it's as sucky as ever. I work for an IT shop that's completely run by non-IT people, and it shows. We've been converting our organization where the people we hire into leadership are like, professional "leaders". Like, that's their skill. Leadership. They know how to be political, and take dumpster fires and put them through the spin cycle, and they know how to shoot rainbows out their butts and declare that everything is awesome and everyone is special. We're losing our competent technical folks, and our incompetent technical folks have started to figure out that this is a great way to do nothing and collect a paycheck for it. Our whole operation is just going straight into the crapper, and it might be time to start looking for other opportunities. I'll need to stay within the university to maintain that tuition benefit for the kids, but there's bound to be other opportunities out there.

I had a great time following your travels on FB! Sorry that the return to work sucks. Having worked for a purely political agency (HHS) I completely understand where you're at. We were hiring people at the top who had no clue and didn't want to take the time to do anything but "lead." Retirement looks good some days and I'm glad I'm out of it but really miss the money that enabled me to pretty much do whatever I wanted or needed done.

Would you believe that I did apply for a position at the local college when we were told that our offices were moving 45 miles away? I was told that a. I was over-qualified and b. they couldn't pay me what I was making. I didn't even mention salary to them - all I wanted was OUT!

I often have days where I'd be willing to entertain the idea of just moving to an apartment for a while and selling this place, just so that we could get out of the mortgage and I could get whatever kind of job I wanted (or have no job at all for a while). But ultimately I have not yet reached that level of desperation. I keep surfing the internal job postings at the university and I've made a few inquiries, but I don't have the option at the moment of taking a pay cut.

So.... I'm likely just going to have to suck it up for 4 more years until Jake is done with HS, and then that stupid job is going to be a thing of the past. In a perfect world, Nicole is a graduate of architectural studies by then and can help us restore a dilapidated old farm house somewhere. But there's a lot we all have to get through before that becomes a reality. Until then, I'm content with my dreams....

You’ve put into words what I feel is the problem with much of the US. They are far from “leaders” - puppets and politicians. Silly little people with worthless degrees and no experience. Hospitals are governed by people with no life experience let alone compassion or concept of patient care. They jump around from meeting trying to justify their positions and ridiculous six figure salaries and six figure salaries.
Substitute most corporate names and there-in lies the root of the problem with any given company I know of - including the two major political corporations in our country.

But I really want to just say, so happy you’re home safely and we’ve enjoyed driving across the southern part of your state!