I do hear that this internet thing might become big. I should learn to leverage a web presence.
Sometimes I feel I am on the verge of figuring it all out. Often I think I am not even close.
I need to come up with something so innovative and lucrative that I do not have to earn money from a career. That opens up tons of career choices because you can get all kinds of jobs if you are willing (and able) to work for nothing.
I had a nice birthday. For breakfast, my wife and kids put a candle in a stack of pancakes and sang happy birthday to me.
The guys that I work with bought me lunch.
I got gifts and taken out to the Outback Steakhouse for dinner.
I even got cake and ice cream.
The gifts I got were nice. My wife got me a beer of the month membership. I hope I can keep up. Apparently she decided to pay month to month so if my beer stock gets too high we can take a month or two off. I do not forsee that being a problem. The only bad thing about it is that an adult must be present to accept the shipments. There is no way to know exactly when one will arrive, and the shipping company is sort of a long way off in the event that we are unable to be at home for a delivery. Anyway it will be interesting to see how much of a pain this ends up being.
So, what am I going to be when I grow up?
When will I actually grow up?
At the moment, when people ask me what I do for a living, I tell them I am a "Computer Geek". That is pretty much what I am, but I do not think I am a very good computer geek. I am not really a specialist at anything. I am also not really a good generalist. Quite often (most of the time) when people ask me a computer question, my answer is that I do not really know. Do not for instance ask me what kind of computer to get. I do not know. Basically, I try to get the one with the best specs for the least amount of money.
I cannot build a computer.
I cannot hack into the Pentagone.
Lots of times when I speak to real computer geeks most of what they say goes right over my head.
The fact that I have a job at all has more to do with a series of lucky events (due to my semi-charmed-kind-of-life than any kind of tallent I have. I am actually kind of a lazy idiot.
It is interesting because no one seems to think that except me, unless an aweful lot of people have been lying to me my whole career. Whenever I have had to rate myself for job reviews I ALWAYS rate myself very low compared to my managers.
Of course, for the past two years I have been my own boss, so it has been awhile since I have gone through that sort of process. I still talk to peers and clients and think my perception of my abilities and worth is much lower than those people.
So, here I am, a 38 year old, self-employed computer geek who does not think he is a very good computer geek. I enjoy being a computer geek for the most part, but I just do not think I am great at it. And I am not the kind of person who is out there killing myself to become great at it. I am not pationate enough about work in general to strive to be the very best. So, I am not even close.
Actually, I guess technically, I am the employee (the only employee) of an S-Corporation. One of the guys in the same situation I am in says that is not the same as being self-employeed. I am not sure I agree with him, although, I do see his point. I will still call myself self-employeed, though.
A guy just told me that by 2015 there will be the biggest demand in history of technical resourses here in the US. That means I will have all kinds of opportunity whether or not a bulk of the developer jobs are overseas. I just have to maintain my mediocre status, and stay up somewhat and I am golden with the job I have now.
So, in the meantime, I still have time to figure out what I want to be when I grow up. If I pass my 65th birthday and still do not know, maybe I'll start to panic.
Happy birthday to me.
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