Voice of the DBA

Tag: sabbatical

  • Sabbatical 3 Review

    I’m back. My last day of work was Jun 27 and I came back a few days ago, on Aug 13. Just over six weeks away and I am very grateful to Redgate for allowing me the break from work. This was my third sabbatical, and it was mostly unwired, which was new.

    Or as my wife said last week, I was practicing for retirement.

    I think I was, as I didn’t have firm plans when I started and tried not to feel pressured to get things done, but I did have a nice mix of being productive and relaxing. Here’s a look back.

    Week 1

    Week one started with expenses. I know I was off, but I had a lot of expenses in June with travel to multiple places and I needed expenses done. I spent a few hours Monday getting those done and submitted, as well as playing a little guitar and relaxing.

    The week had me at the gym, swimming outside for the second time this summer, doing some yoga, and a little yard work, but mostly relaxing. It had been a long May and June, and I took it easy, spent time with my wife, cooked for the kids, and tried to unwind.

    This was also almost time for volleyball tryouts, so I was at the gym, running some practice sessions.

    Week 2

    Week 2 was a bunch of medical appointments. I had a yearly checkup, a dentist, and an ortho appointment that diagnosed golfer’s/tennis elbow. I’ve been bothered for months, but hadn’t done much about it. Not great news, but it did slow me down from doing too much work this week. My wife and spent time running errands around my appointments, we got some supplies for our basement, which was being finished, and I relaxed more. I did some chores around the ranch, but not too many.

    Learned how to play “While My Guitar Gently Weeps”, although it’s rough. Need more practice.

    We also booked some trips this week for the sabbatical, which have us something to look forward to.

    I spent some time this week with volleyball tryouts eating up partial days.

    Week 3

    Despite my elbow, I had to go to work this week on the ranch. I wrote about this earlier, but this was roof replacement week for our riding arena.

    A long week.

    Week 4

    We finished midday on Sunday with the roof and Monday morning my wife and I were off to Cancun. The plan was Monday – Friday, but we were enjoying it and decided to stay until Sunday.

    Expensive, indulgent, but we had a good time at Secrets the Vine, adults-only, all inclusive resort. An amazing view from our room and good food and drinks all week (too many).

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    I wouldn’t do it again, but despite a good time and enjoying the week with friends, I prefer more movement on vacations, so I’d choose something else. But I’m a weird, type-A, keep moving person.

    Week 5

    Mostly chores, trying to not aggravate my elbow. I had purchased a few things, like a brush cutter, so I got those things assembled and did some work around the ranch. I also built a tire rack, organizing the spare tires in the shed.

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    Some gym time, some chores, and some maintenance. I managed to get a couple sprinklers working that had been broken and spent an afternoon at the gym fixing some chairs for the club.

    Week 6

    I had a quick trip to Chicago for work, coming off sabbatical for an event at Wrigley Field. I had never been, so I was willing to do this. My wife was supposed to come for a 2 day trip, but she cancelled with our other plans so she could work. As a result, I was in town for about 26 hours, and enjoyed myself. A beautiful view from across the street.

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    It was weird to be back at work and sit in the airport and make a bunch of notes from the event. It’s been awhile since I was typing that much.

    I turned around 24 hours later to head to Big Sur, CA with my wife and our oldest. We’d agreed to take him on a trip and we spent 5 days there, bleeding into this week.

    It was a fun trip, more our style with biking, hiking, and moving around a bit. It’s a beautiful part of the country and the weather was amazing. Here we are a Bixby Bridge.

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    Overall

    Overall it felt like was retired. I had things to do, but no real time pressure. I didn’t let the 6 week limit drive me, but just moved around day to day. Taking my time on things and not worrying about what got finished and what didn’t.

    I could have done more, but it was a very relaxing time and I feel ready to get back to work.

  • Sabbatical 3 – A week of work

    I hadn’t made many plans on the sabbatical, and that was fine with me. It’s been a busy year, and I wanted to be unwired and unwind. It turned out this has been a good test of retirement for me and I’ve enjoyed it.

    However, we did have a big project on the books and decided to schedule it during my time off. This is my wife’s indoor riding arena.

    It’s been on the ranch since 2010, but a very heavy hailstorm damaged it almost two years ago. A number of small holes in the fabric let rain in, which has worsened over time. We worked through an insurance claim to get new fabric and some installation compensation, but decided to do some of the work ourselves since the install cost was high. We did pay for a vendor consultant to help for a week, but my wife, kids, and did all the work.

    This was scheduled during my sabbatical and it turned out to be a bigger project than expected. They told us to budget 2-3 days, but it turned out to be 6 for my middle son and I, with lots of help on the other days getting things done.

    Here’s the fabric being cut by my son to be pulled off.

    It took a day to unwind all the nuts holding things down and then cut down the fabric. A lot of labor, and more than needed, since a custom tool that they send for installs wasn’t available for us. I suspect the original crew didn’t save it for us.

    However, the consultant asked if I knew a welder, and we do. The husband of one of my wife’s clients has a shop and has been teaching my daughter to weld. I bought a 7/8″ socket and a piece of pipe and my daughter went over there during the day. She returned with a custom made 20″ socket, which made the install easier later in the week. Here’s my kid using it.

    Day 2 was pulling over the first piece of fabric. We used the tractor to do this during a time of low wind. We can pull up to about 10mph, but after that it’s too dangerous.

    This was the easy part. We had to then pull the piece sideways to cover the truss. That’s a manual process, working around the edges, slowly pulling things right with 2″ webbing. Once that was done, we then wove in 1″ webbing between the frame and the fabric. We got this done on Day 2, and we were tired.

    We worried a bit about getting this done, but on Day 3 we managed to pull both the 2nd and 3rd pieces. We did the middle, and then stretched it. We started weaving in the fabric, but had a moment of low wind, so we quickly pivoted and got the third piece pulled.

    We managed to get it partially stretched and tied down before it got too late. Our consultant left and we worked to get the 2nd piece finished.

    Day 4 was us working along. Once we got the third piece stretched, my wife and son were tightening wire that spends the edges of each piece of fabric. A few remote Facetime calls with our consultant had them working through it as I wove in the last piece.

    A good view from above. My wife and daughter were a little scared about the height, so my son, a friend, and I did all the weaving above 10 feet.

    A shot of my son and I working.

    We rented a second lift late on Day 2 and I wish we’d done it earlier. Things went much faster with two lifts.

    Day 5 was the final weaving and tightening things down. We closed the day with most everything done.

    Day 6 was me cleaning things up, picking up trash, patching a couple holes in the ends while we had the lift and my son tightening the nuts (shown above).

    We finished just in time as Day 7 was my wife and I heading to Cancun for a well deserved break.

  • Sabbatical le Troisième: A Recharge Week

    It’s been a week since I flew home from London and Redgate to begin my sabbatical. Actually, at this time last week I was just about to land in Chicago on my way back.

    I hadn’t made any big plans, and despite my wife pushing, I wanted to spend a week at home doing little.

    Mission accomplished.

    I got back and spent Sunday and Monday doing some chores, trying to catch up on some lawn maintenance and weeding at the ranch, however, after that I slowed down. While in Cambridge I was attacked by a mosquito the last night and ended up with a few dozen bites on my arms. My body doesn’t react well to these and I’ve had a lot of itching and welts on the arm.

    I did a few chores, helping my daughter as she’s working two jobs and sometimes get late with things on the ranch, so I’ve filled water and cleaned stalls. I cleaned a UTV and found the reason why the brakes weren’t working. A broken caliper, so I drove that to the shop after debugging a loose battery cable leading to inconsistent starting.

    It’s worse in the sun, so starting Tuesday I decided to slow down and spend a little more time inside. I worked on cleaning out closets and doing some household chores. I also caught up on laundry, played some guitar (re=learning Angel from Montgomery, and trying to learn Secret of Life, which is hard). I also managed to spend a few afternoons with my wife not doing much, relaxing and catching up in person, as opposed to on the phone.

    I have a few things planned out and bought some pieces and parts. Today I replace a gate wheel and cut some wood to repair a feeder. I’ll grab a few pictures and post to show that I am being productive.

  • A Well Deserved Break

    This is my last day of work. Not forever, just for six weeks. I’m off on my sabbatical after today and won’t be back until August 11. However, everything should run smoothly with Grant and Kellyn holding things down until I return. Have a little patience with them as this site can be a bit of a hectic whirlwind at times, and they still have other jobs to do.

    It’s been a wild first half of the year. After very little travel in Jan/Feb, the rest of the year has been a bunch of travel, including most of May and June being on the road. With coaching responsibilities for two teams from Jan-Apr, I am ready for a break. No big plans, but I am looking forward to being at home, playing some guitar, working on a few projects while trying to be very unwired for six weeks.

    I know most of us tech professionals likely deserve a break from work at some point. I am very lucky to get a sabbatical, on top of vacation allowances. It took my a number of years to understand and learn to relax while on breaks. Too many years of being on call, owning a business, and driving my career forward had me delaying or skipping vacations some years. I carried over a lot of days from year to year at many positions.

    That’s a bad idea.

    We need breaks. We need to recharge, and while I wasn’t thrilled when Redgate’s policy changed, I have come to appreciate it. We can only carry over a week, and I try not to do that in any year. They want employees to take breaks, and I try to do so. My wife certainly appreciates me getting away from work and not checking email, Slack, etc. I was nervous the first few times I left SQL Server Central for a week, often trying to get an hour of work to check on things every morning while on vacation. I come to trust that everyone at Redgate will keep an eye on things and ensure the site keeps running.

    I may still blog about the sabbatical, but I don’t know it will be any sort of priority. I’ve been quite busy up until today and haven’t had time to plan much of anything. That won’t make for any interesting blogs, but it will be a well-deserved break.

    Steve Jones

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