Category: Life with Pratts

The Beginning of the End

My working life started shortly after my 16th birthday, and I went full-time immediately upon graduation from college 40 years ago. I’ve been with my present employer for the past 36 years, and one month from today I shall be a retired April Fool.

Fortunately my health is fine and I’m jumping out of the workplace door, rather than being pushed, as has happened to many technology workers of my generation. I had long been thinking about taking early retirement a year from now anyway, so I’m really not moving the schedule up by all that much.

And yet deciding to call it quits was a very long and difficult process, and none of the reasons behind it are happy ones, so I will not be celebrating the event. Any doubts I had about my decision vanished when my father’s health declined suddenly and he needed to be placed in assisted living. Flying back and forth to Phoenix to deal with this crisis has been a job in itself.

What will I do with my time after the situation with my father settles down? Honestly, I don’t know yet, but as this blog has shown I have a lot of varied (albeit nerdy) interests, and I’ll find ways to have some fun.

A weighty matter

It’s been ten years since an inflamed tendon in my ankle forced me to stop running for some months, and it was during that time I started using WordPress to replace the old static Web pages that had been here. After physical therapy, I found that the easiest and most effective way to strengthen my ankle is to wear a 5-lb. weight (except when running!). The worst one I tried came from the now-bankrupt Sports Authority, and the best I’ve used is the one I’m wearing now, from Dick’s Sporting Goods.

Ankle weights

Three of the four reviews at that link are very negative. I’m only wearing one of the ankle weights, so if it starts to fall apart I’ll switch to the other one and assume it will last at least as long.