Back in the Saddle Again

With apologies to Gene Autry, I’m back in the saddle again. CASPA, which is the Centralized Application Service for PA programs, opened up for applications for the 2024-25 round of PA school applications. I actually logged in last night, but there were no changes, at least as of 1:45 AM ET. So sometime between then and 10:00 AM today they finally opened things up.

So I’ve officially started the process for the second round of PA school applications. As loyal readers know, last year, my total was all “thanks for applying, but no” except for one school that waitlisted me. For various reasons I didn’t pursue that one very hard. While I had had hopes for being accepted last year (which would have meant I’d be taking classes now, or starting within a few months), the chances honestly where low. It’s actually pretty common for folks to take 2-3 attempts before getting in. There are a variety of reasons. So to play a bit on Arlo Guthrie’s words from Alice’s Restaurant Massacree, “Kid, have you rehabilitated yourself?” In other words, what’s different this time?

Well, my overall GPA is still an issue, there’s little I can do to completely fix that short of taking probably another 30-40 credits worth of classes. But my science GPA has improved and I’ve added a few more useful classes to my transcript that will help with a few of the schools I’m applying to.

Of course, as I mentioned some schools tend to want to see repeat applications, so I’ll be checking that box.

My patient contact hours are much higher. For the schools I am most interested in, the minimum number of patient contact hours was 1000 hours, I had barely met that last time I applied. Now I’m at over three times that number, with over 3000 hours under my belt. This also exceeds the mean average for most of the schools I’m applying to. I’m hoping this shows my dedication and interest. And as I’ve said before, the fact that it’s in the ED helps a lot because it shows I have a wide variety of medical experiences (things I’ve assisted in or observed first hand include several spinal taps, a thoracotomy, bone reductions, and more.)

And finally, better references. This isn’t to disparage my previous references; the people I had selected I have a great deal of respect for and I believe they share the same in regards to me (and at least one shared the letter of reference he sent on behalf and I was overwhelmed by his positive words). But this time around, with at least two schools, I will have far more targeted references, for example from graduates of their schools, so that tends to help. In addition, at least one professional reference is one that knows me even better than the reference I used last time. So, I’m hoping these references make an even bigger impact than last time.

I haven’t fully decided which schools I’m applying to this time, nor exactly how many, but the process is moving forward. There’s a few schools that are obvious choices for me, and a few that are on my no list this time around that were on my list last time.

But that said, this weekend (only because I’m starting a 12 hour shift in 2 hours and need to sleep tomorrow) I’ll be moving ahead quickly with the application process.

I’m excited and nervous!

Close Encounters of the Eclipse Kind

One of the clips of a movie I like is from Close Encounters of the Third Kind, just before the alien mothership arrives at Bear’s Lodge (aka Devil’s Tower). “Is everything ready here at the Dark Side of the Moon?“

Well, yesterday everything was ready. In 2017 I had taken a bit of a leap of faith and driven all the way to my uncle’s place in South Carolina in order to observe totality. Despite thirteen hours driving southbound and I think close to twenty driving northbound (due to traffic and a nap) I decided it was totally worth it. Totality was unlike anything I had ever experienced before in my life. If you didn’t get to see it then or in 2024 (or any other time) let me tell you that there is a 100% difference between 99.9% coverage and totality.

So, with some last minute planning, Randi, Ian, and I were aboard Amtrak’s Adirondack yesterday, bound for Port Henry, NY. It appears we were far from the only ones who had decided to forgo driving and to risk potential tardiness (though we had a buffer of over an hour) and cloud cover (mitigated by fully refundable tickets). According to the conductor, 130 people were scheduled to get off Port Henry that day. In contrast, it appears on average, Port Henry has 3-4 people get off or on the train day. Amtrak apparently called the town supervisor a few days previous to let them know 150 people were bound there. Suddenly they were planning to do some stuff right near the train station, something they hadn’t planned on before.

The Adirondack, preparing to depart Port Henry, NY after dropping us off.

Like last time, the build-up was interesting, but also a bit boring. It’s not until you’re at over 50% coverage or so do you start to notice a dullness start to cover the land. It’s sort of like a cloudy day, but different in a way I can’t necessarily describe other than muted. This grows as coverage increase. We spent our time walking around, buying and consuming a pizza made in portable trailer based pizza oven (not bad, but I normally wouldn’t have paid as much for it as I did, but hey, I was hungry and it was supporting local business).

As 99% approached, we could definitely feel the temperature drop and now everything was really simply in dull colors. At that point, my eclipse glasses were basically glued to my eyes (with an occasional peak at the landscape around me).

Then 100%: Totality. Glasses came off. People cheered and shouted. There was a hole in the sky where the Sun should have been. If you’ve never seen it, it’s bizarre. Literally where the Sun should be, is a dark black dot. It’s the darkest thing in the sky. It’s a bit unsettling.

I can’t recall if I saw it last time, but this time I definitely saw the Sun’s corona. When one considers who big the Sun really is, the eclipse drove home how far from it the corona can extend. I also saw, and confirmed with others, that I saw what apparently was a solar prominence. It had a very distinctive red color and for me appeared at about the 7 o’clock position on the Sun.

Then, just minutes after beginning I saw a flash of the “diamond ring” and put my glasses back on. It was over. We waited for our train, boarded, and once my ticket was scanned, I fell asleep. It wasn’t so much because it was anti-climatic as much as because I had just worked my standard 12 hour shift, plus 3 more the night before. (I literally went from work, straight to the train station).

I still can’t really put to words the experience, but I do know Randi and Ian also came away with the belief that the trip was well worth it.

I will just say this, if you ever get the chance to be in totality, do it. This is especially true for the folks I’ve heard about and say things like “well I was at 99.9%, that’s good enough”. No, it’s not. So, if you make plans to see an eclipse, get into totality. Yes, I get it, you might live or work at say 90% and decide “that’s good enough” and logistically it may be, but honestly, the closer you are to totality, the more worth the effort it is to get all the way. It’s not worth travelling from 40% to 60% but it is for 99% to 100%.

And here’s looking forward to the next North American eclipse in 2044, and perhaps ones elsewhere sooner!

Randi overlooking Lake Champlain

My Inbox Today

I posted Tuesday about the end of my contract with my largest client. One of the last set of steps I took was to take my email address off many jobs and alerts. The difference has been stunning and well worth it.

My inbox for my main business account is now down to fewer than a dozen emails a day. I apparently missed 4-5 alerts from my client that I’m getting cleared up, but other than that, now it’s emails related to other items.

Not only has this made my email box reading a lot easier and faster, it honestly has given me a lot of relief. For example, for the last few months of 2023 and the first two of 2024, there was an important job that started to randomly fail around 4:00 AM. If I was at work in the ED, I’d be stressed about getting home in time to rerun it (and to try to debug it). Fortunately I finally resolved that about a month ago, but still kept my eye on it.

In addition, there was another major server issue that would randomly occur with one of the VPNs. We hadn’t seen the issue in months, but I had been paranoid about it failing. Sure enough, I found out from a former coworker that it failed Sunday night for the first time since December. And my first thought was “well thank god it’s no longer my problem.” I mean I felt for them that they had to deal with it again, but it wasn’t anything I had to worry about. That was refreshing.

This morning, after a 12 hour shift in the ER, a bunch of us went out to breakfast. It’s the first time I could do that and not worry about having to get home in time for a meeting or needing to check email. Again, it was refreshing and relaxing.

I think I’m enjoying this so far.

A Door Closing

So I’ve hinted a bit on some social media about a change. The change has come. I would have posted more details yesterday, but given that particular date, I didn’t want anyone thinking I was trying to do an April Fool’s Joke.

So the door closing is that as of March 31st, my contract with my largest client is over. This was actually a mutually agreed upon date. In fact, when my manager scheduled a meeting with me in December, I knew it was coming and expected he would want to end things in January or even perhaps December, so honestly, I was quite pleased to have the extra time.

That said, it was obvious to both parties that this was coming. I was spending less and less time on projects for them. This was due to actually a variety of factors. Strangely, a huge part of it was something that I hadn’t planned on: Grand Jury Duty. During the weeks I was on the Grand Jury, between that, the class I was taking and my ED Tech work, I had very little time left over to spend with this client, so they didn’t assign me any real projects at that time. But even besides that they had been using my skills less and less and I had been allocating less time to them. So, the end was inevitable.

And to be honest, I’m actually very excited about this. When I made the decision over two years ago to apply to PA School, it was driven in a huge part because I was tired of IT. I was also tired in part of having to learn new things in IT. Specifically, I didn’t want to learn who to do what I was doing in new ways. For example, the SQL Server world is moving more and more to Azure and other cloud providers. I’m actually in favor of this. But it’s really simply doing much of what I do in a new way. That’s not a challenge that excited me.

If I am to learn new things, I want to learn them in a new domain of knowledge. Becoming an ED Tech and eventually a PA is just that, learning new things in a completely new field. Some of my skills remain the same. One of them is my ability to solve problems. I’m just applying that skill in a new arena. This is exciting.

What’s also exciting is for the first time in over a decade, and ignoring two breaks, really since before the turn of the millennium, that I don’t need to be checking my email almost constantly. For a variety of reasons, most of my IT jobs over the past 3 decades have, if not required me to be available 24/7, at least highly encouraged me to be available 24/7. With my ED work, when I’m done with a shift, I’m truly done. No one is going to call me at home and ask me to log in and do an EKG on a patient. Right now my ED work is officially only part time, but I can pick up shifts, something I’ve been doing a lot. But on the flip side, I’m under zero obligation to pick up shifts if I don’t want to. The fact that I’m not on call and that I can pick up or not pick up when I want to is very liberating. I’ve been looking forward to this for awhile.

Another short-term change is that I don’t have to worry about trying to fit in client meetings with my currently highly variable sleep patterns. Last week for example, because of the shifts I picked up and one regular shift and my client needing meetings, I basically only got about 8 hours of sleep in a 56 hour period. I couldn’t get a solid “night’s” (since I generally sleep during the day because of the ED night shifts I work) sleep. I had to wake up and attend meetings. That’s over with.

And in some ways, there’s no going back. That’s not strictly true. My IT skills are still fresh and relevant and I have enough industry contacts that if I wanted to change course back, I could. But I don’t see happening.

Really the only downside is the change in income. Trust me, IT work pays a lot better than ED Tech work. However, fortunately we’re the point where total income isn’t as big as factor as it once was. Basically I can afford to “follow my dream” and we can still maintain our lifestyle. We’re fortunate that way.

So what’s next? Well later this month the application process for my second round of PA School applications begins. I’m much more hopeful this time around, though we’ll still have to wait and see. Assuming that’s successful, sometime in 2025, I’ll start a two plus year journey of again diving deep into learning with very little free time and I’m looking forward to that.

But in the meantime, I expect to travel a bit more, relax a bit more, work on some more projects around the house. Overall, I expect to simply enjoy life more.

And perhaps even blog a bit more than I have been.

Pride in my Work

I was driving home from my work in the ER the other night and a thought passed through my head, “You know, I’m damn good at my job.”

Now this may sound a bit conceited and perhaps it is, but I went with it. The truth is, it applies to by my IT work and my ER Tech work.

Now, let me be clear, I’m not saying I’m the best there is. I’m not even sure I would say I’m great, nor would I claim I’m the best ED Tech there is in our department. I’m not even sure there is a single “best” since our job responsibilities are so broad. But I am damn good.

I’ve talked about my IT work and how some of my code is still running years later without any real issues. It’s not world shattering code, I didn’t write the next LLM AI code (and I’m not even sure where I’d begin on that) but it does its job and is solid. So I’d say I was damn good at my IT work. I’m a published author (though last year apparently my book sold zero copies according to my most recent royalties statement) and have several online articles to my name. I’ve also spoken at numerous conferences. I’m proud of my work. Yeah, there’s better folks out there in many specific SQL areas, but I’m still proud of what I’ve done.

Similarly, with my ER work, I’m at the point where I think I’m pretty solid. There’s one skill I definitely am NOT solid on (blood draws for those curious) but other than that, I look back at where I started over 3000 hours ago and I’m proud of where I am.

There are several reasons I like to think I’m good at my job. One for example is that I’m often the “go to” person. More than once a nurse or even doctor has told a colleague, “oh, go ask Greg, he’ll probably know.” Often this is in relation to where particular equipment or materials is stocked, but sometimes it’s on a policy or procedure.

I also appreciate the fact that in terms of general skills I have received positive comments.

Lately I’ve also been doing a lot of precepting new techs, something I very much enjoy and I like to think I’m good at (and based on the comments from more than one, they seem to appreciate my teaching). I also received a HUGE compliment from one of my managers who praised me for how I teach and what I was teaching. One of my real joys in life is to be an effective teacher and to have that recognized really meant a lot to me.

And, as I am about to begin the second round of PA School applications, I’ve had more than one of the provider offer to write a letter of recommendation for me. This also means a lot to me.

Now that all said, as I stated at the top, I’m not great at my job. I think anyone who starts to claim that is probably wrong and should have a close eye kept on them. But I think I’m damn good and every day I strive to be a bit better than the previous day and to keep getting better.

So I’m good, but every day, a bit better. I hope.

Ending an Era, Starting Another

First, a quick update on my PA school applications. Another school reached out to me yesterday to say “Thank you for applying, but no.” There’s a longer story there, but suffice to say, I’m now down to waiting to hear from one last school, which is a super longshot, so at this point, I’m basically considering my first round of PA school applications over. (Astute readers may recall I’m still waitlisted on one, but it’s doubtful, even if I move to “accepted” I’d attend there at this point.)

And I’m fine with that. It’s very hard to get into PA school on your first round from what I understand. But more so, now, it gives me some closure for the rest of the year. Several events I had been trying to plan, but were in limbo lest this most recent school accepted me, can now be finalized. So, the no, while a bit disappointing gives me some certainity.

Meanwhile, another step in the process been moving forward, and that’s ending my consulting status with my largest (by far) client. This has been a mutually agreed upon process and if anything, my work with them extended longer than I had originally hoped or expected.

It’s a bit bittersweet though. For one thing, the money is pretty good, and that makes a difference when making my plans for school and other projects. But honestly, I haven’t been able to dedicate as much time to the client as I’d like because of my ER schedule and how much time I’ve been dedicating there. Most of the time I’m now working overnights in the ER. This client has required my time for meetings and other events during the day. This has meant a few weeks where I’m definitely sleep deprived for multiple days in a row. So while I’ll be making less money, I’ll definitely be getting more sleep. I think that’s a good trade-off.

It’s been clear to me for awhile, that the move to medical is the right one. This is evident in my paychecks as much as anything else. I honestly make about 6-12x as much doing IT work (depending on scheduled work or overtime work) as I do for my ER Tech work. This means I can easily work 2 hours of IT and then go into the ER and work a 12 hour shift and make about the same at each. Obviously, in general most of us would rather work the 2 hours than the 12 hours for the same pay, but I 100% enjoy the ER work more.

So, at the end of this month, I’ll be removing a number of scheduled ongoing meetings from my calendar. I won’t be checking my work email account nearly as much. I’ll sleep in a bit more. I’ll evolve my non-work schedule around my night shifts. And I’m good with that.

When I started working in the ER over 15 months, and 3100 hours ago, I saw it as sort of a “necessary evil” to get my patient contact hours for PA school. I wouldn’t say I wasn’t looking forward to it, but I definitely did not expect to enjoy it quite as much as I did. Fortunately I have. It’s reinforced to me that medicine, in some capacity, is where I want to be.

So, one era, IT is closing, and the other, medical continues to open.

Transporting a Patient

One of my duties as a tech in the Emergency Department is to occasionally transport patients to surgery. These transports are generally one of two types. The first is what’s often called a “red-sheet” surgical procedure. These are usually traumas where we’ve done all that we can in the trauma room and have to race them to the Operating Room for emergency surgery. These require a nurse or two, often a provider and generally a tech or two to help drive the stretcher. This isn’t always the case. One night an assistant manager nurse and I were the only two to transport a dying patient to the OR. We were moving fast. I was pushing and she was monitoring his pulse the entire time, basically running backwards as I pushed. At one point in a hallway a column was in our way and she nearly got clipped as I wasn’t about to slow down. Knowing her, I think she’d rather I had clipped her than slow down the transport. As a side note, I can’t recall if I’ve mentioned it, but personal space often isn’t a priority during traumas or situations like this. As we turned a corner I felt her reach down to my leg and grab my stethoscope out of my side pocket so she could quickly check his breathing. There wasn’t a request or warning, simply the grab. In cases like this immediate patient care is more important than the personal space.

The second type of transport are far less urgent, but still more urgent than waiting until a convenient time during the day. The patient isn’t within minutes of dying like the above, but the situation is serious enough that the surgeon wants to start cutting within the next couple of hours. That was the case the other night.

This patient had come in with a small, but growing growth inside her. It was causing them incredible pain. But more serious, if it continued to grow, it would certainly burst the tissue it was growing in, causing severe bleeding and possibly cause sepsis and in 9-14% of cases the death of the patient. This was a surgery that perhaps could have waited until the next day, but the surgeons decided it was more prudent to do it as soon as possible.

As I wheeled her up to the OR I reflected on how it had taken no longer than 1-2 hours from the initial diagnosis to getting her consent and then getting her to the OR. All in all there wasn’t really anything remarkable about this.

And there shouldn’t be anything remarkable about this. If I were describing a patient with appendicitis or some cancerous tumor threatening to burst it wouldn’t be remarkable in any state.

However, in this case, it was an ectopic pregnancy.

Now, let me be clear, a quick search of the literature does not find any state that outright bans treatment for ectopic pregnancies (and to be clear, treatment in this case means either a chemical or a surgical abortion). However, that hasn’t made doctors and hospitals nervous over the lack of clarity at times. This can lead to a delay in treatment. This is unacceptable.

In cases like this, medical treatment should be determined by competent medical personal and their patients.

A Review of Exceptions in State Abortion Bans: Implications for the Provision of Abortion Services

https://www.healthline.com/health-news/ectopic-pregnancy-and-abortion-laws-what-to-know

2024 A Year in Preview

Ok, yesterday I looked back at my goals for 2023 and reviewed what I had achieved and what I hadn’t. There was a smattering of accomplishments and a smattering non-accomplishments. Happens every year.

So, that said, what am I looking to do for 2024.

• Get into PA School! My goal had been to be accepted in 2023, but that didn’t happen (though I did get waitlisted at one!) This is going to be perhaps the hardest goal to achieve, but the one I’m most focused on. What makes it hard is my undergrad GPA is holding me back. This has been an ongoing issue, one I can’t really change. But I’m working several avenues to get in anyway.
• Keep working in the Emergency Department. Technically this is a part-time job, but because they’re often chronically short of techs, I’m often able to pick up extra hours. Last year for example (including training and a few days I took off for vacation) I worked 2200 hours. I’m not sure I’ll work that hard this year, but my goal at least is to be at over 3000 hours by the time I start my second round of PA School applications (this includes the 300+ I achieved in 2022).
• Keep my Red Badge certification in the ED. This allows me to be the Lead Tech on Traumas. This won’t be hard. I simply need to lead 3 traumas in 2024 and I’ll have my Red Badge for 2025. I’ve honestly had shifts where I’ve done that in one shift.
• Cut back on my IT consulting. This is a mixed bag for me. It’s honestly where the bucks are. But I’m enjoying it less and less. That said, to any of my #SQLFamily members reading, if there are quick projects you need help with or short term items, let’s talk.
• Work on me and be a better person. While I think I’m generally a pretty decent guy, I’m aware of some issues I want to work on. That’s about all I’ll say for now.
• Meditate – even if it’s just a minute or two a day. This is related to the previous goal. I want to be more relaxed in life.
• Relax more. Sometimes it seems like I do that a lot, but honestly this past year I took a number of classes, did my IT consulting and worked in the ED. I want to slow down just a bit. And honestly, my 56 year old body is telling me this a bit more.
• Hiking – I put this down every year and rarely get out and do more. But perhaps this is the year.
• Biking – I definitely didn’t make my goal last year. Perhaps this year. My new schedule for work might actually allow me to bike to/from work. We’ll see if I actually do that at all.
• Caving – again, need to do more. With the NCRC weeklong in NY this year, I’ll be busy planning that.
• See friends – twice in December we had friends over for an evening of hanging out. We’re going to do more of that. We used to do more pre-Covid, it’s time to do more. In fact, I think we already have a night setup to watch a few episodes of From the Earth to the Moon (Spider and Galileo Was Right for those wondering).
• Travel – nothing big this year due to budget and time. Though, if I get accepted into a PA School, I may take more time off from my work in the ED to do more travel.
• Get our new septic system in. This was a goal last year that didn’t happen for a variety of reasons.
• Finish several projects around the house. I think once I’m done with the IT work, I’ll try to focus on this.
• MAYBE take a class or two. I’ve taken pretty much every conceivable pre-req I can for any PA school I’ve looked at, but it might be fun to take more classes anyway.
• Blogging – I definitely won’t be doing this every week, but I’ll continue from time to time.

2023 A Year in Review

Well, it’s that time to look back on the year and see how I made progress on my goals for 2023.

• It was a mixed bag. For one thing, I was looking to up my patient contact hours to hit the minimum required to apply to my programs. I hit 1000+ hours by the end of April. I’m now at over 2500 hours and closing in on 3000 hours. (For those doing the math, yes, that’s over 2200 hours this year alone. That’s on top of my IT work and taking classes!) The nice thing about these numbers is they put me above the average for all the programs I’m applying for.
• And yes, I said applying for. While a goal for 2023 was to get accepted into a PA program, it didn’t happen. I will admit it’s been discouraging. It became even more discouraging to learn, via email, that one of the programs I had the most hope for, despite not having an official minimum GPA, hasn’t accepted anyone below a 3.2 GPA in the last 5 years. I’m not irked so much about that number, but as much about how they market the fact that they don’t have a minimum when effectively they do. Oh well. Now the good news is, I did get wait-listed at one program. We’ll see how that progresses. I’m undecided on if I’ll actually attend if I move from wait-list to accepted. And there’s at least one long-shot of a program I have yet to hear from. So we’ll see.
• But, I will be applying to a number of the programs again this year. I’ll have a stronger resume in a number of ways, so I’m more hopeful. But I’ll be honest, if I don’t get accepted this year, I may explore other options in my life. If I were 5 or 10 years younger I might consider a lot more rounds and work more on my GPA, but the truth is, I’m not as young as I might like to be.
• That said, I did get a lot of classes in over the year, including the microbiology class I needed. This was sort of a freebie. My employer, Albany Medical Center, offers this free to its employees over the summer, so I took it then. It was actually a lot of fun and I have to admit, I was a bit surprised to learn how much had changed since I took it 30+ years ago. Science really has marched on.
• In addition, this fall I took Genetics. Not many programs required it, but one or two did and I figured I’d add it to my transcript. I’m glad I did. While the mechanics of the class was a bit frustrating at times (all virtual, some lectures had no videos, only PowerPoints), it was really interesting and I learned a LOT.
• For my NCRC work, we will be hosting the 2024 National Weeklong here in NYS and I’m the site coordinator, so I’ll be getting busier and busier as June approaches. Interest has been great. We filled all the available class slots in 25 hours and as of today have 13 waitlisted for Level 1 and several each for Level 2 and Level 3. And as for TOTS, our medical focused class, I think we have a curriculum and will be asking for approval to do a trial teaching of it this year. So that’s all coming together!
• I mentioned continuing to blog, but the truth is, I didn’t blog as much as I used to. Between needing sleep (see above about working, school, and more) and not having much to say, I just didn’t blog much this year. Oh well.
• Reading: Honestly, I dropped the ball on this. I expect to continue to do so. I did reread Echo Heron’s book, Intensive Care: The Story of a Nurse. I recommend picking up a copy.
• My goal of speaking once this year didn’t come to fruition. I was hoping to be picked to speak at Pass Summit about how to do a career change, but wasn’t accepted. Oh well.
• I can’t say I saw more of my friends, but I did see a number. I also worked on schedule changes, twice now, so that should free up more time. So time won’t be a huge issue, but money will as I’ll be being frugal to save up money for PA School. But hey, let’s get together!
• Septic System: well we got the design approved (that only cost around $10K!) but didn’t get it in this year. We’re hoping to get the quotes and get it started as soon as Spring comes.
• Hiking, Biking, Caving – I did far less than I’d have liked. That’s all I’ll say for now. I will add though that I’m feeling a bit older and my body reminds me of it.

One thing that was NOT on my list of things to do, but happened anyway, was serving on a Grand Jury. On top of serving, I was also the jury foreperson. This was quite an experience. I saw a lot about how the justice system works and as foreperson I got to swear folks in (which I’ll admit, is kind of cool) and also review the final paperwork before it was sent to the judge.

So, that’s my year in review. Stick around until tomorrow and I’ll see what my goals for 2024 are. Hint, a few of them are listed above already!

And thanks for everyone who was with my on this journey through this crazy thing we call life.

Missing SQL Summit

I’m not going to be at Summit this year. And I have mixed feelings about that. This would have been my first in-person Summit since 2019.

I had hoped to go. In fact moreover, I had hoped to present. I even had a topic submitted on exiting the industry. As many of you know, my plans are to get into Physician’s Assistant school and change careers and become a PA. You can read about my adventures in numerous posts here. So I figured, instead of the plethora of talks on “So you’re new to being a DBA” or similar, I’d offer the opposite, how to exit the industry in a positive and productive way. But as a hedge, I made sure to buy a ticket at the early bird pricing, figuring if I was accepted to speak I could get a refund then.

Sadly, my topic wasn’t chosen. That said, if you’re interested in hearing it presented, let me know. Just give me enough time to actually finish writing the presentation.

But at least I had a ticket. I was set.

But then I started to wonder. Was it worth the time and money? I don’t make a whole lot as a ED Tech, and I’d be using vacation time, so I wouldn’t actually lose any money, but I also wouldn’t be able to pick up extra shifts. And of course I’d need flights, and a rental car (I stay with friends so lodging was covered). And I realized that the main reason I wanted to go was to see my #SQLFamily. And I’ll say, that’s not a bad reason. But it’s also not inexpensive.

I finally started to put feelers out about selling my pass, but wasn’t really pushing it. And then, Grand Jury duty happened. There’s a decent chance I could have impressed upon the judge how important it was for me to attend Summit, but I didn’t think that was really right. Though, had I been selected to speak, I think I’d have made that argument. It wasn’t clear exactly when my Grand Jury commitment would end, but it was fairly clear it would overlap with Summit, and it has. Though, in a cruel twist of fate, it appears that we will in fact finish up this week!

But enough about why I’m not there. I’m here to say, I miss you all. I miss the lack of sleep, the plethora of food, hanging out on the couch at Minionware, getting massages at the VMWare booth, catching up with friends, oh and actually learning about SQL Server and the entire Microsoft data platform.

I’ve been giving my departure from the SQL arena a lot of thought and a phrase keeps popping into my head, “the long goodbye”. For now it’s not a binary process. It’s not “one day I’m a DBA, the next a PA”. For now it’s more of a DBA by day (and sometimes nights and weekends) a student taking pre-reqs (and in fact just took notes on a prerecorded genetics lecture this morning) and an ED Tech by night and weekends (and sometimes days). But I’m drawing back. I can’t recall the last presentation I gave. I haven’t signed up for SQL Saturdays. I barely attend my own local User Group. Even my consulting hours have been cut back.

But every day I’m more and more sure I’m making the right career move. I find myself missing my IT work less and less.

I’m saying good-bye, slowly. And sometimes it’s bittersweet.

This is not my final goodbye. I don’t know if there will ever be a final goodbye to any of you. But for now, however, you all… I miss you. Enjoy Summit for me!