It's about time I made another post.

OK, I have not been very good about making it so, at least when it comes to regular posts. The main reason is that my adopted son, who will be two years old in June, takes up so much of my free time, that it is hard to get anything done. I am a bureucrat. One of the primary rules of bureaucrat survival is to find someone to blame who can't defend himself. Sorry about that, Adam.

My older son, Robert, has been much more diligent about posts on his blog - Blog of the Enders. He is running for State Representative for the 80th district of Indiana. Saying anything more would put me in violation of the Hatch Act, which prohibits us bureaucrats from becoming involved in partisan politics. However, I am not forbidden to make me thoughts known, especially with regard to a certain politician who is not eligible to be re-elected. So, let me say that I am in the shrinking minority of people that approve of most of what President Bush has done, although I disagree with some of what he has done. On the big things, he did not lie when he warned of Saddam Hussein having weapons of mass destruction, and I think invading Iraq was the right thing to do. Privatization of Social Security in the only thing that will save it. The only other alternatives are decreasing benefits, raising taxes or both. That is just the way the numbers work. Medicare is a bigger problem, and making it a bigger problem yet by expanding it with prescription drug coverage was the biggest mistake of the Bush presidency. Medicare is doomed, and the aftermath is going to be very, very ugly. Again, its just the way the numbers work.

A Joyous Distraction

I just got back last night from a week of taking my family to see my family. My wife Sandy, and my son Adam just went to Indiana for a week to show Adam off to his brother, sister, paternal grandmother and three aunts. He charmed everyone, including a lot of people in airports and on airlines in the process of getting their and back. I think the reason why babies are so cute is to make their heads bigger when everyone tells them how adorable they are. Adam is nearly always not only happy, but enthusiastically happy. He is also affectionate. It makes one want to spend a lot of time with him, and he always wants the attention. The price for all this happiness and affection is that he is wearing Mommy and Daddy out. He wants to be held but he twists and squirms to see things and just hanging on to him is very tiring, as is holding him as he jumps up and down on my lap. As a result, I am not getting things done as I would like, including keeping up with my classes and investments, as evidenced by the fact that I was interrupted three times while writing this post. Not being able to invest the money in my IRA may not have been a bad thing, though. The stock market is at its lowest point of the year and apparently headed lower.

Bringing Technology to Silicon Valley

The week of being trained last week did not get off to a good start. Getting to the meeting was a hassle because the 8:19 a.m. Acela Express train to Washington was cancelled. I got my tickets changed to the 8:45 a.m. regional train to Washington, but it did not arrive in New Haven until about 10:00 a.m. and didn't leave until about 11:00 a.m. because a switch was frozen. Each stop took longer than usual because several doors were frozen. My arrival in Washington, which was supposed to be at 12:47 p.m., did not happen until about 6:00 p.m. I think Amtrak needs to devote more resources to equipment maintenance. Before the training got started the next morning, we trainees were herded into a small room to fill out forms to have security badges issued to use. The only information on the forms was names and Social Security numbers, and did not have to be signed. Since the information on the forms was already available, I think the forms and the cattle treatment was unnecessary. The badges should have been made ahead of time and waiting for us.

The object of the training, the electronic folder, is quite an amazing process. To put it briefly, hearing offices are going to have to learn a lot of technical knowledge in a short period of time. Right now, I am in the second week of training, where I help give the training to a hearing office. The trip to San Jose was long, and the other trainer and I were taken to the wrong Hyatt Hotel because the brochure for courtesy shuttles only listed the one nearest the airport, and we didn't know that there was more than one Hyatt here. San Jose, California is a beautiful city with a beautiful climate. I tend to favor places were palm trees grow. Teaching technology to people working in the heart of Silicon Valley - wouldn't that be something to put on a resume?