Amazing connections

I was thinking the other day, about how many years it's been since I started in the electronics industry and how many people I have met and known. Sometimes it is just mind boggling. It was 1979, I was not yet 19 and here I am at almost 50 years old. Yikes! Where did the time go? My first gig was at Almac/Stroum in Georgetown. That one didn't last even a year but I still remember almost everyone's names and faces. Of course through out the last 30 years there have been people I wish I didn't remember or even have met for that matter but hey, life doesn't give you mulligans so oh well. Conversely though, there are people that I really wish I would have kept in touch with over the years. Some of them I really miss. Now that I'm so much older, most definitely wiser, and have my priorities in this world pretty straight; friendships, relationships and associations are so much more important to me.

When I was at Almac there were probably at least 50 people there that I remember and sadly I am not in contact with any of them. The next place was Spectro Acoustics and there are a few from there that I keep in touch with. The next was SGC where I was the purchasing agent and I soon met tons of distributor sales people. The next stop was Arrow Electronics where I spent the next 4 years. One of those years was spent in southern California and another was at the corporate office all the way over on Long Island. At Arrow I met people from all over the country since I was supporting the branches and distribution hubs as a corporate product manager. I had the opportunity to do some traveling then as well. However, New York was not my home so child in tow, I came home with no job lined up and no prospects. It took awhile to find something when I got back home but along came Western MicroTechnology, then ES/Chase, followed by IEC, then Shannon, and most recently OutBack Power.

I think I could say that the number of people that I crossed paths with is well over the 1000 mark and is probably more than that. Like I said, it is mind boggling at times. When I first started, alot of the people I knew were at least 10 to 15 years older than I was. Some of the people I knew early on have passed away, retired, or sucessfully left the electronics industry to pursue other interests. Others are still plugging away at their respective distributor, OEM, or rep jobs. I've worked in all aspects of electronics; distribution, manufacturing, rep company, contract manufacturer and I would say that my favorite environment has been in manufacturing.

I would go back to any of those environments however, at this point because I want to work. I will also work outside of the industry, for the government, or pretty much anywhere for that matter. The thing about it is that I like diversity, I like meeting new people, I like learning about new things. Hey, on this last go around I learned a ton about renewable and alternative energy and since I had never been a facilities manager before, I gained an enormous amount of knowledge and skills doing that. Learning new things and having new experiences is what keeps you growing as a person.

Well, that's probably enough for tonight. Tomorrow I'm making homemade blackberry jam and blackberry pancake syrup. Yep, it's good stuff.

See you on the next post!

The job search heats up

I was laid off at the end of May and here it is September 1. I had a great summer with Jim and Sean, went on two vacations, and took care of most of my project list and now I'm ready to go back to work. I need to go back to work. Not just for the money, which I do need, but I am not a successful stay at home kind of person. I need to be busy and challenged. I need to make a contribution to a company that I enjoy working for and I need to be productive. There are alot more projects I could be doing both inside and outside of the house and I will continue doing that until I go back to work but now that Sean is going back to school and vacations are out of the way, I'm ready.

So, the all important "networking" has to be stepped up. I'm checking all of the common job search websites but word of mouth and contacts both personal and professional will hopefully help to increase visibility.

Alaska update

Ok, it's time for pictures then on to the next post. I have alot of ground to cover since I haven't posted since the 11th of August.





So, this cruise we went on was on Norwegian Cruise Lines (NCL) and took us up through the Inside Passage of southern Alaska. This was our second time going to pretty much the same places but this time on a different NCL ship. At any rate, I would recommend this trip to anyone. And it is not just for old people. There were alot of kids, teens, young adults as well as us "old" folks. It was a 7 day cruise which went to Ketchikan, Juneau, Skagway, Glacier Bay, and Victoria with a couple of "at sea" days. The scenery was the most amazing part of the cruise. It was incredible. The mountains are right next to the shore, the glaciers so close you can practically reach out and touch them and the wildlife phenomenal. We saw humpbacks breaching, orcas hunting, harbor seals snatching salmon, bald eagles in trees, and big bears near the shore. The weather was perfect and the water was like glass. Something that we didn't see last year that we saw on this trip was a glacier "calving". This meant that a chunk was breaking off and falling into the water. It literally crashes into the sea. So cool!


In Juneau we went panning for gold, in Skagway we went on a helicopter and walked on a glacier (it was 8 degrees there), and in Ketchikan we went to the fish ladder then went shopping. In Victoria we went to Butchart Gardens but it was very disappointing because it started getting dark almost immediately after we got there.


The food on the ship was great, the casino was a blast, and the juggling duo of Sharkbait was really funny. It was so good that we bought their video.


Just to give you an idea of how incredible the trip was, we took over 1400 pictures. Of course not all of them are perfect and you wade through the imperfections but I would have to say that over 1300 were keepers. I bought a new program for making great slide shows called "Roxio". It took a bit to figure out but I made a killer slide show set to music with transitions. It consisted of a little over 300 pictures.