Happy 2006

And no bad jokes about writing 2005 on checks for a month.

Not that I'm the first to write about it, but '05 did sort of suck.
What to look forward to in '06, then? Some new faces in congress, one can hope.
Some rain in dry Southern CA (which started on New Years Eve) would be nice, though not too much, we're babies when it comes to bad weather..
There is much to look forward to. I bet it won't start out easy, though.

It reminds me of a story.
2000 was pretty much the most stressful and worst year of my life, and not unlike a lot of people, a good amount of that was of my own making.

My first marriage started coming unraveled in '99 and came completely so in 2000 and in that same time period our family was dealing with the loss of my grandfather who had been in my and my brother's life on a very regular basis since the days we were born.

In the last two years of the millennium (2000 was the LAST year of the 20th century, thank you, NOT the first of the 21st. There is no year zero!) I hated my job more and more because the company I worked for over about 16 years had now become completely evil and sucky, so I thought I should do something different.
After all that time as a union man, I worked hard to learn what I could to get into the world of computers and did just that in the spring of 2000. That's the stressful part, which has been worth it in the long run, of course.
However, as the year wore on and my marriage unraveled, I realized that I had to make some serious choices because I could not afford to live in Silicon Valley as a single-income unmarried guy in the lifestyle to which I had been accustomed. Thus, with a LOT of stress on my part, I searched down here in San Diego County and made the move.
I quit my job, lied to the mortgage broker and lender and bought a house without the benefit of a job to pay said mortgage. I moved in on Dec 30th, 2000.

2001 started out ruff.
I didn't have a job, had a meager savings with which to stay afloat and missed my friends and family. Thankfully I moved close to my brother and his wife.
The first and only "roommate" was a drunk and a loser (I guess you could be a drunk and not a loser) and was always stiffing me on rent. In the end, when he finally moved out without telling me he was going to do so and he left me with a check he knew would not cash, I got the money anyway with the help of a nice lady at his BofA branch.
That was pretty sweet.
Tech work was not to be found with very little experience, so I called back on my 16 years of grocery work and landed a job at a really cool organic store. Not much money, though.
The one thing that held me through this tough beginning to a new century, was the great woman that I met, who is now my wife.
Man, without her, 2001 could have seriously turned out to be the next suckiest year in my life.
She's so completely my opposite in so many ways that it's perfect for me and I love her very much; we were married in 2004.

I landed a couple techie contracts during the year, and then one good one in Sept. that I would stick with for almost two years.
'01 started out not so fun, but with my best girl and some hard work on my part, it turned out to be damn good and left me all but forgetting those last two years of that damn old 20th century.

So get ready. '06 might start out shitty. Hell, some northern Californians are just now drying out from a heck of a storm right out of the starting gate.
But I have this feeling, same as my personal years were a while back, that we're in for a nice one even if we have to fight for it a little bit..

By the way, wish me luck as I'm going for my CCNA at the end of the month.
That's my own personal way that I'm hoping to start the year out right.