Category: Work

I really enjoy working as a programmer, I really do. It is what I wanted to do when I graduated from high school, little did I know that it would take over twenty years to finally start working as one.

When I was in high school I found computers and computer programming endlessly fascinating. We did have a programming class available in school. I really don’t remember what kinds of programs we created in the class but there are a few things that I do remember. We stored everything we did on a singe 5 1/4″ floppy disk which had a storage capacity of a whopping 1.2 MB. Also that we worked on Apple IIe computers with green monochrome monitors. Other than that I don’t remember what we did.

At home I had a Commodore Vic-20. Actually I still have it, it is upstairs but has a bad power switch so it won’t turn on. It hooked up to the TV through an A/V switch on the back of the set. I would write little programs in BASIC. I would spend hours working on a program. I would run it over and over until I was satisfied with it. The unfortunate thing is that I didn’t have a storage device, so I would get it to do what I wanted, run it several times, and then turn it off and it would be gone forever. I have no idea how many hours of my work disappeared into nothing.

In late 2010 I discovered that was eligible to attend college using the unused portion of the GI Bill from my early enlistment in the military. Once it was confirmed that I would be able to attend college I had to decide what I wanted to do. I thought about maybe something medical because there would always be job opportunities but in the end I went with programming. So I went back to school at the age of 40 and received an Associates Degree in Computer Information Technology. The same week I presented my final project I accepted a job offer to be a web developer. It was truly a case of right place at the right time.

I now get to go to work everyday and do something that I thoroughly enjoy. Currently I am working for the Nebraska State Legislature and get to work in the State Capitol, pretty cool.

So, I was quoted  in a blog by a friend who works here in the Turbine Flats building. OK, it isn’t a direct quote, but it’s pretty close and it generally displays my amazing grasp of the English language and proper grammar. The depths of my philosophical thought is pretty breath taking too,

 

For your reading pleasure:

 

Alex Speaks!

 

Amazing huh? Maybe sometime I will write a post about what I think that statement means to me.

It is time for me to go spend ten hours with the felons again. Putting on my uniform helps get my mind in the right place for work. I hop into my pick-up and take the twenty minute drive out to The Lincoln Correctional Center. Although Lincoln is in the title of the place it is outside the city limits. I soon have corn fields all around me, and then there is the prison. The place is both intriguing and uninteresting. Set far back from the road, the building seems to jump out at me from the surrounding corn fields. I arrive at the place I spend forty or more hours of my week.

Continue reading Hangin’ With the Felons