Goal planning has ceased

Its sad, my goal planning as like totally ceased.
I used to write down goals and review them.
Between 1996 and 2005 i was probably incredible focused in life.  I had goals, I made milestones and achieved stuff.  I had books I wanted to read, stuff I wanted to study, graduate school, earnings milestones etc.

Now.. I just vegetate collecting paychecks and looking around for random girls to date.  I live a carefree life but it is starting to take a toll on me.

Work-wise career is flying. Weird, i don't care about work so much, but I am going a fine job.  Global heads like me, boss likes me, everyone likes me.  I started to think that Asia is ultimate for me.. I'm asian, I have solid communciation skills and people genuinely seem to like me.  I find myself to be in the ultimate middle-man job, I coordinate between NY/LDN and Asia, and between all of Asia.  I am doing nothing in particular but just passing around info and guiding.  weird role.. but its ok, it comes natural to me do to nothing.  haha

Anyways my goal this year is really simple
- Lose bit of weight, start running or something
- Find new passion in life, maybe Guild Wars 2
- Think about my future and make some decisions (work, love, life)

Fatherhood Unveiled

My coworker had his baby.
The guy is the most anti-father guy I know.  His dad left him before, so he has his own reasons.  He was pushed to marry a gal and father the baby...  i know the feeling and he has second thoughts.  But he is now a father!   He ought to start his blog...    even to the day before the kid came he was thinking "damn i hope the baby doens't make it" -- haha sick but true.  he's very frank that is important.

The issue we have is nobody wants to discuss the dark side..  i'm sure there are many dads or moms who didn't want a kid and now that they have one they hate it.  However all we can ever really hear is "oh you'll love it when you have one" or "i love my kids but they drive me crazy sometimes" or its tough blah blah blah.

Reddit had a great analogy
http://www.reddit.com/r/AskReddit/comments/jsvjy/are_there_any_parents_out_there_that_dislike/


"Are there any high school dropouts out there?"

*"I finished high school."
*"I did too"
*"I thought about dropping out, then didn't"
*"My cousin seems like the kind of guy that might drop out.. we'll see"
*"I didn't think I was gonna finish high school, but then I did."
*"You'll finish high school, don't worry about it.
*"Yeah dude, you'll definately finish high school, even if you think you won't."
*"I'm a high school dropout! ... Just kidding, I'm a novelty account, haha."
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Same thing happened when a redditor wanted to know about childfree older couples who don't regret it. 500 comments saying "We're really glad we had kids!" or "I'm only 17, but I somehow know you'll definitely regret not having them!"

What I find fascinating about Reddit, specially Ask Reddit and IAmA, is the ability to find out about other people's lives and what they really think about things.

But it never works when the question is taboo. You just get 500 comments supporting the status quo, and any comment that answers honestly is buried.

Another one:
http://parenting.blogs.

nytimes.com/2011/06/10/a-
father-with-regrets/

Anyways I question it because i'm not sure either, and I hate to be filled with regret.  Then again I hate not having tried and never knowing....

If i could only live two lives and find out which is better... alas I only live once.

Can I go back to SV ?

I wonder..  can I make it back to Silicon valley?

- bay area is indeed nice
- no action and no bay billiards so bit boring maybe (there are always options as Tombo knows)
- bay area has 2 ex-gf's to avoid uggg
- but bay area is so snooty.. i hate that part its so rich and elite.  thats what keeps housing hot but also depressing for rest of us losers.
- sis doesn't live in bay area.. no family around

But ultimately the bay has jobs!  if i can get one still...  i just read an article on how Google pays families for 10 years 50% of a workers salary if they die as extra benefit on top of life insurance.  Omg man are you nuts.  That is like 5x salary payout which is way more than any other company w/ their builtin life insurance policies.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/meghancasserly/2012/08/08/heres-what-happens-to-google-employees-when-they-die/

Compare to my job.. no future.. no benefits.  Can't even get money to take a class or few $k for training some poor lacky.

The other problem is pay differential.. i heard SV folks can now make $150k salaries. I have no idea if thats true but wow... back in 2005 when I last looked, $120k was top pay I could ever find.  I dont think it was just a poor search because as I have stated many times i have searched for more jobs than people dream about.

So back in 2005 it was Financial boomtime..  maybe SV jobs paid $120k + benefits / stock, but Financial firms paid $150k base + $50k bonuses so it was an obvious cash cow.  Turn the clock forward, if tech pays $150k + death benefits, and banks are stuck at $150k base + almost 0 bonuses.. you tell me whats going to happen... ?   Well nobody is going to join the banking tech groups anymore.

The red herring (for me) is that banks dont lower pay for old timers because its too demoralizing.  Guys who joined earlier will still make their $200k but its been made clear they are overpaid and its not going up.   New joiners are also stuck at where they were on pay baselines.  So what you have are old guys sitting on nice 'legacy' pay packages (many at $300k+) with nowhere to go without a huge pay cut.. and no incentive to bust chops and earn any more.   We are screwed.   So they (we) sit and wait.. try to get a few more paychecks in.. before the end...

But you don't want to be the last to jump off the sinking ship do you?  Timing is the perennial question.  When is the bottom or is there one?

This is my issue..  i feel i may want to take what cash i have, buy a house and life the easy life... hmmm

maybe i should see if i can still code or not

Of Baby's and LIfe

Wow my coworker who is alot like me..  a loser, 42, well set with investments, making good money but no wife, no kids, no gf, and highly demotivated... is having a baby !

Seems everyone moves on.. moves forward or i dunno.  He's absolutely terrified because he doesn't really love the gal as far as he's said, and doesn't want to have kids, get married or anything.. but somehow when push comes to shove he's committed!  Wow i'm amazed.   if this guy can commit then why can't I?

hmmm anyways it doesn't make me wanna go impregnate someone but makes me wonder.  should i roam this earth alone or what.

this year i am going to try to buy a house/duplex somewhere, then snowboard alaska and next year try to take 1yr vacation.  thats all i want to focus on for now.

I'm pooing

Imagine how many people surf Web while pooing nowadays

The average time in toilet must be a lot higher now

Lost productivity?

Finance Industry has me worried it is a downward spiral or is it a cycle? Dot com was a bust people would say that was once in a lifetime but it never died nor did anyone really think tech was dead... People just got more cautious about throwing money into any tech project.

I'm at a Twilight of my life where I earn good cash for doing stuff not deeply technical.... I ponder the next 10+ years...