Glenn Hamilton Has Left The Building!

I would've thought that with all this time off I'd have found time to update my blog before now but the motivation just hasn't been there. I'll try to do better.

Glenn Hamilton has left the building! Glenn has been a controller in my area of specialty for the last 17 years or so since transferring from Albuquerque Center. In all that time, I've only ever worked with Glenn a handful of hours because of our schedules. He's a diehard Minnesota Vikings fan and would bid a schedule opposite mine that allowed him to take in their games. He always struck me as the kind of guy I'd like to have worked alongside; very competent and easy going.

Here's a link to a set of photos I took at his farewell party. Glenn is just left of center wearing a Hawaiian shirt in the photo to the left. I believe Glenn chalked up 32+ years with the FAA. Wishes for many years of retirement bliss, Glenn!

I'm slowly making my way back to more normal health but I've still got a ways to go. I tire very easily. I've been out on my fat-bike down by the river a couple of times in the last few days but each time I had to pack it in earlier than I wanted. I arrive there with ambitious plans to do 25-30 miles but there's no way that's happening yet. I do my 14 miles between 35W and the Bloomington Ferry Bridge then head for home and I'm okay with that.

I tried a helmet mount for my GoPro, setting aside my pride in favor of a full-blown geek look hoping it would result in less shaky videos. It didn't. The videos were even more shaky than anything else I've done and I was surprised by that.

I got an invite from a friend (Hynek) to join a group ride tomorrow night along the same river trails I've been riding lately. The ride doesn't begin until 6:00 so this will be my first experience with both night riding and a fat-bike group ride. They had about 20 riders last week. It sounds like a blast! I went out tonight and bought a light at Erik's Bike with hopes that it will see lots of use in the years to come. Tammy lets me do pretty much whatever I want but I actually ran this one past her first to get her okay considering all I've put her through lately. She and Rachel both shot down plans I had to do some night road riding years ago but this is different because I won't be mixing it up with traffic.

I have no idea how well my GoPro Hero 2 will do capturing video at night but I'm about to find out.

Tammy is down to 21 workdays until she retires. I think I'm looking forward to this for her nearly as much as she is. I anticipate she'll be much busier in retirement than she is now with all of her plans for volunteering. We're still kicking around the idea of just having one car when we're both retired. I hear very few people say that that's a good plan but I really think we could make it work. We'll see.

Charlie gave us both a laugh this morning. I was on my way out to the garage with a bag of trash in hand when Tammy opened the bedroom door for them to come charging down the stairs looking to eat. I greeted them and continued toward the garage. That wasn't good enough for Charlie. I heard him run back upstairs to where Tammy was and bark loudly at her, twice, as if to say, 'hey, dad's leaving and we need you to feed us'. It was so funny.

I'm in the middle of a month off from work as I steadily get my health back. The decision to retire or go back and finish out the last several months of my career still hasn't been made, or has it? There's a real possibility that I won't get my medical certificate to work traffic again and in that case, I'll be done. The plan is to try and get it back then go from there. I'll begin jumping through those hoops tomorrow while taking it one step at a time.

In the meantime, I can practice being the retired guy who watches the squirrels outside his window in the morning while sipping his coffee with chocolate creamer and marshmallows. I've got this down!

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