10 Years of Blogging

Ok, I know I have not blogged consistently for 10 years but I did my first post on June 12th 2006.  I had just started my first engineering job (summer internship) in New York City (NYC).  I lived with a teammate and her family (thanks Rosows') 30 minute train ride north of Manhattan.  I still have fond memories from time running 10-15 miles after work, then going to the gas station to get one of those one dollar Arizona Green Teas in the big can and sit on the curb sipping it whilst the last of my sweat dried up.  This consumption of Arizona Green Teas foreshadowed my next summer of employment in Bagdad Arizona thus the new name of the blog - Bagdaddy.  On weekends, I would drive to Rockefeller state park to get a longer run in sometimes.  I think I also went to hawaii with my family that summer and also made a trip to Penn state for a long weekend to meet my friend Ronit.  

I digress...10 years is a long time and a lot of my life but i feel like the last 8 years have been pretty stagnant.  I only made one significant change which was moving to Australia.  I acknowledge that is a big change but I thought I would have had more new milestones in my life by this point - house, wife, kids, different career, more direction in life...etc

During college, I felt like i was always running around to the next new thing --> graduate high school, pre-season camp, school starts, thanksgiving break, semester ends, christmas break, pres-season camp, spring semester starts, spring break, semester finished, finish up the track season, hang out for a week on campus, start a summer internship in new york or arizona, repeat for 3 more years.  I liked that schedule because there were always milestones and checkpoints out on the horizon to keep things fresh and give yourself a chance to start anew.  It also had the side benefit of plenty of breaks between each new endeavor to go do stuff whether it be a road trip or a long hike in the woods or experience XYZ new thing for the first time.

Now in the working real world, you really have to make your own fresh horizons and milestones.  No one is going to do it for you and the schedule well defined because there is none.  It is so easy to just sit back and forget to push for the next thing.  First of all, there are infinite options.  Secondly, comfort is hard to let go of if there is no incentive.  Thirdly, it is easy to dig yourself into a hole - a good or bad relationship, debt, desire to reach certain financial milestones.  Finally, there is a paralyzing internal dialogue that is in constant turmoil on which direction to go.  We'll see what the next 10 years has in store for me  

I wish I would have kept the blog going more consistently because it is really funny to see how I was thinking back then.  Since 2006, blogging has taken the backdoor to other flash forms of social media like twitter/instagram/snapfish/chat/periscope.  I still really enjoy the longer format that blogging.  It takes a long time to craft a post but it has more deep meaning and reality than a single picture and caption...

You can still find the first post on the old blog aptly named Triceraptops Man here:
https://triceratopsman.blogspot.com.au/2006/06/summer-or-bummer-debut.html

MONDAY, JUNE 12, 2006

Summer or Bummer: The Debut

Hey guys this is just a little test to see if this works. Right now it’s June 12 at around 930 post meridian time. I'm probably going to go to bed very soon because I have to drive to New Jersey in the morning to attend a safety class. Can you believe I have been living with kyra for about three weeks? Its not bad either. There’s a lot of time to myself meaning I don’t have to spend free time helping my parents with chores and other stuff around the house. Instead, I am able to get a pleasant run after work and relax the rest of the night. I miss playing with friends back home. People around here have different ways of entertaining themselves than we do back home. For example, a night on the town in New York means wearing a stylish collared shirt and socializing with friends whereas a night on town in Sewickley Hills means dressing up in all black, running through the neighborhood, setting off fireworks and jumping in neighbors' pools hoping that someone will call the cops because it just makes the night 50 times more fun. Well boys and girls I'm going to do a little reading before I hit the sack so talk to you later

Picture at top:  I didn't even have a digital camera then so I used one of those disposal ones that you use then go to walmart to get prints or a CD with the pics.