Working, Traveling, and Other Such Musings

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Sarge's Friday post inspired me a bit in that he talked about his pending retirement and what he'll miss.  While I still have several more years of work to come, the thoughts and plans for my own ceasing of production have been in work for a bit.  Not that I'm hoping the day will get here soon, or that work is a pain, quite the contrary.  But several of my peers from when I first started have now retired, or will soon enough.  And as they discuss post-career plans, I think about the same. 

I've only been at this new gig for just over a year, but it has been a good one.  It was a big change of pace and scope- from managing a Mine Warfare portfolio, to overseeing the management of Undersea Experimentation and the development of CONOPS- Concept of Operation.  As we test and experiment on new systems, we have to write down how we plan to use it, who will operate it, how it'll communicate back to the ship or shore station, and what support is needed.  That part can be a little dry, but the actual experiments we're conducting is exciting, such as sending little robots out of subs to do interesting things, special comms between a sub and the F-35, and using 100 mph unmanned boats to drop off interesting things.

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In the last gig I had several bosses, which isn't optimum, but had been doing that job for 13 years so I was on auto-pilot.  I also ran my program in a way that my bosses wanted all others in my department to emulate.  So it was nice for the first law of Navy thermodynamics* to always be maintained.   

In the new position, which was a nice bump in pay, and a commensurate level of responsibility, work is very different, but far more interesting.  Mine Countermeasures and Mining had long since grown monotonous and highly disrespected by Big Navy, whereas submarine operations and other undersea missions have top level interest.  They are also the things that good authors write exciting books about, ones that stack up on both mine and Sarge's nightstands.  

As a supervisor though, I have my own office and no longer work in a cubicle environment, rolling up my sleeves on the daily, which I actually didn't mind.  I had great co-workers in a fun and often hilarious work space that is somewhat missed.  I'm a pretty social guy so it was a change to not have that same work environment, but the pay, parking space, office, and potential for upward mobility is an even trade off.  Not to mention the coolness factor of the things I work on now.

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My boss, another S-3B Viking guy, is approaching his mid-60s and won't be here forever.  He's been bringing me in on all his efforts so I can pick up the ball whenever he decides to punch out.  He's even said "when you take over for me" a couple times.  That would be another bump, (good), with added stress (bad).  I had a little incident when I first took this job- some chest pain and too-high BP, which sent me to the ER, but it turned out to be just stress related as I realized I had a lot to learn and I was also absolutely dreading the commute home.  It's only 10 miles, but it was taking 40+ minutes due to traffic that I didn't have in the last job (10 minute commute).  I started listening to conservative talk radio on the drive home which really lowers my BP.  HA!  Nah, I just relaxed and realized it's just part of the job and to not let it get to me.  It was a transition for me though- commuting, supervising, planning, etc.

I only have a few folks working for me- two military, one civilian, but my boss has four senior civilians, plenty of active duty guys, and a large contractor team working with a fluctuating annual budget ($2-6M) on various Frankenstein projects that have potential to make it to the Fleet.  And if proposals aren't submitted timely or correctly, a lot of those contractors could be out of a job.  That's not the priority- helping the Fleet is, but that money is out there and it'll just go to some other command if we can't capture it.  The powers that be may want another retired O-6 in the billet though, which is probably a good idea as I'm not sure I'd be comfortable juggling all those bowling balls.  He'll get me up to speed whether or not I want to apply for it when he leaves though, because we never get a new hire quickly and I'll have to manage the program in his absence.  We'll see, but in the meantime my wife and I will be doing more of this:

Niagara Falls from the Canuck side.

The Grand Hotel on Mackinac Island Michigan

Humayun's Tomb, New Delhi India, which served as the model for the Taj Mahal

Another garden tomb in Delhi

Rainbow Falls on the Big Island of Hawaii

Waikoloa Beach Resort, Big Island

Chichen Itza near Cancun Mexico

Tampa Florida

Job prospects aside, I mentioned that pre-retirement planning has already begun for me.  My wife and I have been using the leave and travel comp time I earn by taking four trips already this year-  Tampa, Cancun, Hawaii, and Niagara Falls.  And I've been to India twice and Monterey once for work projects.  I have too many friends and relatives who either died too early, or whose health declined in their 60s so we're not waiting to start ticking off that bucket list.  We definitely have the travel bug and a commensurate level of timeshare points, so we will continue to do that both ahead of and after retirement.  My work is very interesting, challenging, and it pays the bills, but whenever I do decide to pull the handle- either at minimum or full retirement age, I won't miss it.  I've gotten a bit cynical after 14 years of Govt service.  Not that I don't like the work or feel that I'm continuing to serve honorably, but I see the bureaucracy inherent to all things the govt touches, and am absolutely unable to change a bit of it.  No matter how much we try to fix our broken and slow acquisition cycle, we still require 20 years to get a system to the Fleet.  And when we attempt to avoid the errors of the past (LCS), we do the same when we build the next (Constellation Class Frigate).  And no program is immune to constant marks by congress**, or reprogramming within the Pentagon.***

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On a more happy note, my Nuke Machinist Mate nephew is newly stationed here in San Diego.  And on the Carl Vinson, which was the best tour of my career.  I just might be able to get onboard for one of those family day cruises to watch some flight ops!  He's got five long years ahead of him, but he'll reenlist for an additional two years this December, at the two year mark of his career.  There's another Nuke bonus for that, and an instant promotion to E-5.  E-5 in two years!  That's what going Nuke does for you.  We'll have him over for family dinners on the regular, which he's already appreciated once.  He's in four section duty though and is under the gun to get qualified so every other weekend he'll be working.  It'll be fun to watch him start his career as I begin to wind down my own.

So, that's what's going on in Tuna world.  All in all, quite blessed and quite happy.  Enjoy your week.

*When the heats on someone else, it's not on you!

**Congress marks up the defense budget and steals money from defense programs all the time.

***The CNO also moves money around so programs are challenged to stay on schedule, budget, and performance.  Sometimes they are zeroed out, which is essentially cancelling them without having to say they're cancelled, or being blamed for it.