Seems like I only just recently left.

I retired a little over 5 years ago in early 2007.  Since then, I’ve worked  three multi-month contracts, doing portions of my old job.

I’ll be starting on another contract, doing the same as before, on Wednesday.  It should last through the end of the year, possibly a little past, with 3 or 4 weeks off in the fall.

Heigh Ho, Heigh Ho.

Yesterday we had a bit of wind and rain.  After the rain had passed, Karen spotted a rainbow through the skylight of the camper and I walked out to the highway to get to an open area where I could see it without trees, structures, or vehicles in the way.  I ended up on the edge of the median of the southbound lane of US 50.  The image is a composite of three photographs.

Nature is so amazing!

We’re traveling again.  My contact job ended about 2 1/2 weeks ago and we left home 2 weeks ago.  This time, I decided I was not going to try to keep up with the trip on a day to day basis.  Each time I’ve done that, I got behind and ended up skipping some days.

I’ve taken a lot of pictures and video, including several fairly decent time-lapse sequences.  Post processing is complete for about the first day and a half of our trip.  I’ll be posting about the trip in more detail when we get back home and I’ll be doing it day-by-day to get the whole trip published in sequence.

We planned to be away from the internet quite a bit this trip.  I pre-scheduled the videos that have been posted every three days or so through to the end of the trip.  Karen is posting pretty much as we go on her blog, but she is also pre-posting for some of the times that we will be away from the internet.

Most of the time when we have internet access, we are camped in an RV park that has wireless and is near or in a town, like Grand Junction, Colorado, where we are now.

a bit of a surprise.

While I wasn’t expecting it when I got up this morning, I’m going back to work tomorrow morning — another contract job back at the place I retired from, working in training, as usual.  They need help and found some money to pay for it.

So it’s back to setting an alarm clock, figuring out when to get to the gym, commuting — all of 20 minutes, with light traffic — and all the sundry things that go with work.

But, it’s only for a few weeks.

Except for that six month contract that looks like it’ll start January 3rd.

The retired part of “semi-retired” lasted 6 months this time.

I’ve been spend a bit of time working on the civil war blog, Daily Observations from The Civil War, and, as a result, have been missing from here for a bit.  However, since much of what will be posted in that blog is going to be time relevant, I want to get a good handle on it before things really start happening.

It’s highly likely that I will be going back to work for another 6 month stint beginning in January which means that I’ll be working during the 150th anniversary of the run-up to and beginning of the civil war.  The amount of time that I’ll have for working on the blog will, thus, be limited – which is the reason for the effort now.

I’m currently working with  “Village Life in America, 1852 – 1872,” by Caroline Cowles Richards.  I went ahead and back posted entries from the early days of her diary and am pre-posting entries after November 14, 1860 so each will be published on the applicable day.

Things were going fine until I discovered the e-text I was using didn’t match the text in the pdf copy I was using to check spelling and wording against.  I had already run into missing text earlier, but had just assumed that an error had been made in electronic transcription.

But, then, I ran into an instance where the entry in the pdf version for a particular date had a lot more information and detail.

It turns out that the pdf version is a “new and enlarged” edition.

In looking into it a little further, it turns out that it is at least the third published edition of Miss Richard’s diary and, probably, has entries included that were left out of the previous editions.

So now I am going back and comparing editions and adding new posts where they were omitted.

Of course, if I used the e-text and pdf for the same edition, there wouldn’t have been any discrepency to be found.

I’ll be incorporating more diaries into the blog, but I’ll make sure that the text and pdf versions are from the same source document.

I mentioned in an earlier post that I had joined with two others on The American Civil War page on facebook. That was 3 weeks ago and the “friend” count for the page was 1,385.  Today, it went over 2,500.

OK. I guess that’s a little overstating it.  I’m not really unemployed. The job is over and the contract is up; I can’t sign up for unemployment because I’m making too much money – from my pension.

Students at a nuclear power plant simulator – photo rendered as a painting. 

This was my second contract since I retired a little over three years ago.  Both have been for about 6 months and both have been doing part of the job that I used to do before I retired – teaching license operator candidates in the classroom and in the simulator.

The class did well in the simulator operational exams administered by the Nuclear Regulatory Commission this week.  The last day of the operational exams was Thursday, which was also my last day on the job.  I had my box packed and was out the door by a little after 6 PM.

I suppose it will take a little time to get back into the swing of not working. 

I think I’ll be up to speed by sometime Monday morning.

I’ve got quite a lot of work to do around our place this spring, summer, and fall.  Of course, we’ll get a little bit of traveling in, too.

Then, sometime in January, it looks like I’ll probably be back at work.  That’s about the time the next class should be at the point where I’ll be needed – if they allocate the funds, which I think is quite likely.

I’ve worked a total of about 13 1/2 months out of the last 36 – and when I do work, it’s doing something I know well and get satisfaction from.

In the UK, elderly customers at charity shops are buying up hardback books – as cheap fuel.

Cheaper than coal?

One assistant said: ‘Book burning seems terribly wrong but we have to get rid of unsold stock for pennies and some of the pensioners say the books make ideal slow-burning fuel for fires and stoves.

A lot of them buy up large hardback volumes so they can stick them in the fire to last all night.’

read the full article in metro.co.uk, Pensioners burn books for warmth.

While I’m moving on – or back – to other things, climate issues will continue to be an interest. With 5 of my last 6 posts being on the subject, it’s time to look at other things.  I’ll try to figure out a way to continue to share some of what I learn, though, without this becoming a climate change blog.

I’m still happy with Windows 7.  My computer at work uses XP, though, and moving back and forth between Windows 7 and XP makes getting used to Windows 7 a little harder, I think.

Yes, I am still working.  A contract extension has been approved and, assuming the VP signs the funding paperwork, I will be there until about the middle of March.  After that, I plan not to work for at least the rest of 2010.

Regular visitors to Exit 78 may recognize that my theme has changed once again.  I have moved to the Thesis theme, which allows a lot more control over the appearance.  I’ve got the basic structure down pretty good now, but I’ll be tweaking on it, so there may be subtle changes day to day.

I still have a little bit of material to post from our September trip, photo galleries to develop and publish and images from the great depression to share.

Moving on.

Yesterday, I was going down the hall heading back to my office, preoccupied with what I was doing.

Sure enough, I walked in the wrong office.

I knew it almost as soon as I opened the door.  I went ahead and walked on in and chatted with Dave for a few minutes before he headed to the class he was slated to teach.

Without thinking, I had gone in the office I had been in before I retired.

Other than personal items and the chair, it looks just the same as it did when I left.

day 57

On Wednesday, another retiree — who I’ve known for over 25 years — went back to work on contract, the same day that I did. He’s working in another part of the training organization from the one I’m working in.

It just so happens, though, that his son is an “in-house” employee in that same organization.

Since he has been contracted to work primarily in a support role, there may be times that he’ll be providing support for his son.

He told me today that he didn’t have problem with doing whatever they needed for him to do, but that his son might have a little bit of a problem telling his dad what he wanted done.

day 37

It’s back to work I go — I think.

We should know something soon as the proposed date to start is June 1st.

The contract schedule will be a little different from last time.  I’ll be working about 6 weeks and will then have about 6 to 8 weeks off while the class is involved in activities that do not require my “expertise.” The entire contract for me will be 6 months of actual work.

During the 6 to 8 weeks that I am off — assuming the funding for the contract is actually approved — we’ll be traveling out in the western mountain states.  We had originally planned that trip for July and August, so it’ll be a little delayed, unless the funding  is not approved.

I really do enjoy the work that I’ll be doing under the contract.  It’s the best part of the job that I had before I retired.

The job will help us keep from dipping into our savings for the duration of the contract and we’ll try to pay down a debt or two so that the pension and other income will stretch further when I’m not working.

Heigh Ho, Heigh Ho, it’s off to work I go…, probably…, maybe.

We’re leaving Harper’s Ferry this morning, heading for Lancaster County, Pennsylvania.

The Chicago Tribune, July 19, 1920

So what was a REO Speed wagon and what did it look like?  See answer.

Sometimes, ya just gotta take a break.

I didn’t plan it that way.  It just sort of happened.

In the last several weeks, I’ve not spent much time working on my blogs or web pages other than a new blog, On Climate, where I now have 7 posts.

I’ve been reading quite a bit.  Besides a reading a lot of material on climate change, I’m on my ninth novel — three separate fantasy trilogies.  But for the internet and computers, I would be spending a lot more of my retirement time with my nose in a book — like I have been lately.  Two of the trilogies are rereads — excellent entertainment that doesn’t cost anything except that I couldn’t find the final book of one of them, the one that I’m reading now, so bought a replacement.

I’ve also been hitting the gym pretty heavily.  The one category of blog posts that I’ve been keeping up with is the Wednesday Weigh-In. For some reason, it has helped with the motivation that I was lacking in trying to get fit.  I am now spending 2 hours a day working out at the gym and have been making steady progress.

With a little warmer weather, I’ve been building storage shelving in the second floor of my at this point unheated and not yet finished shop.

Procrastinating like usual, I’m just now getting our taxes done.  Fortunately, our taxes this year are not going to be the horror that last year’s Taxes, Bloody Taxes were.  In fact, we paid so much in state taxes last year that, for the first time in several years, we can actually itemize deductions on the federal return.  Even though I said last year, “future years should be relatively painless,” it’s still been a bit of a pain digging up all of the deductions.  However, despite my tendency to procrastinate, the return is almost done and we didn’t need a tax specialist like last year.

I plan to be back posting on a more regualar basis, but….

February 27, 2009 — Watching the evening news, it sometimes appears as though the recession continues to spiral downward toward a mini-depression, if not  worse.

Store closures.

Massive layoffs.

Stocks indexes dropping to levels not seen in over a decade.

Bankruptcies.

Reductions in services.

Nonexistent availability of credit.

Continuing high rates of foreclosures and dropping home prices.

We live in an area that has seemed almost recession proof in all of the economic downturns since we moved here in 1980.  Yet, even here, there are empty stores as well as layoffs, foreclosures and higher unemployment.  On the other hand, there are new homes being built, businesses that are adding on or building new, and a few help wanted signs.

Most of the people we know, both here and elsewhere, are weathering the storm fairly well, though not all.  Quite a few people, including two of my brothers-in-law will have to postpone retirement because of losses in their savings and a nephew employed by Circuit City has lost his job.

So far, we have not been impacted, though we have changed some of our spending habits.  In these trying times, it seems better to be frugal and conserve what we have — just in case.

How are things in your area?  Have you made adjustments because of the economy?

Mini-Depression?

In January, I wrote about a coworker’s suggestion that I apply for unemployment when the contract that I was on was over — even though I didn’t need the job when I took it.  Comments on the piece overwhelming supported my decision not to apply for unemployment compensation. (see Applying for Unemployment)

The contract was over at the end of August.  In the turbulent economic months since then, I’ve had a few moments where I’ve thought about the extra cushion that unemployment income could provide.  However, I’ve never had a moment where I regretted my decision.

A few weeks ago I was at one of our every-other-week retirement breakfasts when I heard some fellows talking about putting in for unemployment benefits after thay had finished a contract job.  The nature of the industry that we retired from is that there is a lot of opportunity for contract work for those with the right experience and/or credentials. It wasn’t surprising that the idea of putting in for unemployment had occurred to others.

Apparently a couple of them had actually applied.

They were turned down!

They weren’t qualified because they were making too much money from their pension!

Since I was a contract worker working as an employee and NOT an independent contractor, if I didn’t have any other income, I could have applied for unemployment payments.  However, with my pension and other income, it didn’t seem right to apply.

In the end, I was not only morally right, but legally right, as well.

I would not have been able to receive unemployment compensation.

Posted on flickr by royal_broil

On my last job, one of my coworkers asked me if I was going to put in for unemployment when my contract was finished.

“I hadn’t really thought about it,” I told him.

“You really should, ” he said.  “After all, you’ve been paying for it all these years. It’s your right. I’m going to when I do contract work after I retire.”

He went on about it a while longer, but I didn’t have much to say on the subject.

I thought about it for a while, though, and concluded that, no, I was not going to apply for unemployment.

While the extra income would be helpful, I didn’t need it and, after all, it’s supposed to be used to help those who need it bridge the gap between jobs.  I wasn’t going to be looking for another job.

For that matter, I didn’t actually need the contract job that I was working.  It was helping to pay off some debt and, while I was working, we weren’t having to use any of our investment funds.

So, since I went to work when I didn’t need to, it just didn’t seem right to me to apply for unemployment.  It felt like taking advantage of the system.  (I’ll have more on this in a later post.)

What do you think?  Should I have applied for unemployment?

Image shared on Flickr by Christopher Dick

I guess I don’t know what being retired means.

Either that or it means something different to other folks.

I guess there is being really retired where you don’t do anything that might bring in some extra income.

For some retirement includes working part time to bring in some supplemental income.

Then, there is retired and going to work in an entirely new career field.

As well, there is retired and going to work as a high paid contractor or consultant in the field you retired from — don’t know about the “high paid” part of that.

Then, there is military retirement, which apparently isn’t really enough for anyone to live on, as all the military retirees I know are working full time towards a second retirement income.

———

Even though I went back to my former place of long-term employment for a short stint as a contractor, I was still retired.  Sure, I was getting paid — better than what I was getting before I retired, I might add — for the work, but I was also getting a pension check.

And there was a difference in me that others noticed!

Before I retired, I couldn’t quit without putting my early retirement in jeopardy…, and I was not happy — stuck in a job I couldn’t leave.  As a retiree coming back to work a contract, I always had a smile, something that was more rare than I realized before I left.  I didn’t have to be there and, if I felt like it, I could leave with no adverse consequences other than the loss of pay and reduce likelihood of being asked back again.

Plus, I was getting to do the fun part of the job.

I’m retired and I don’t have plans to look for a new job.  However, if I’m asked, like I was last time, to go back to work for a few months and I get to primarily do the fun parts of the job, I’ll do it.

Until then, Im really retired — I think.

—–

In my recent post, I don’t wear a watch when…, one of the commenters said that she didn’t think I was really retired.

What does retirement mean for you? Do you want retirement without any other work or will retirement include working in some way for you or your significant other?

Image shared on Flickr by fdecomite

When I retired at the beginning of 2007, I stopped wearing my wristwatch.

I didn’t put it back on until I took a short term contract job in February of this year.  At the end of the contract, I again stopped wearing the watch.

I guess, in a way, it’s a symbolic gesture.

I’m no longer tied quite so tightly to the clock, to a routine.

If I need to know what time it is, there’s a clock on my cell phone, in my camera, on the dash of my car, truck, and motorhome, on the back wall of my motorhome, on the TV, computer, microwave — you get the drift.

I don’t need the watch for me to be able to keep track of time.

Not wearing it is pretty much symbolic of a little more freedom.

——–

Is there something you do or don’t do that is symbolic of something?

We’re sitting in a B arnes and Noble in Peoria, Illinois, catching up on e-mail and other stuff.

Today was supposed to be a rainy day so we decided to look for Barnes and Noble stores in the area that we are in so we could get online.  Turned out there was about 10 within 60 miles, but none closer than 50 miles, so we decided to drive to Peoria, Illinois.

We had planned on leaving last Wednesday, but decided that we didn’t want to drive through the remnants of Gustav all day, so delayed a day.  It started raining Tuesday and rained hard all day Wednesday.  We had a lot of water running through the yard off of the road.  Fortunately, though, we live near the top of a hill in the Ozarks, so flooding is never a real concern.  We did get word today that the main highway from our area going north is going to be closed for a month for road repairs.  We figure it was probably slides due to all of the wet weather that we’ve been getting this year.

The drive Thursday was wet most of the day, but there wasn’t any bad rain.  By the time we got to our destination, Fort Massac State Park, we hadn’t seen any rain in a couple of hours and the ground was dry.  Fort Massac is the site of several forts dating back as far as the French and Indian War, each fort built over the ruins of the older ones.  It is located on the Ohio River in southern Illinois, across the river from Paducah, Kentucky.

On Friday, we visited the quilt museum in Paducah, a huge fabric store (Hancocks of Paducah), and the old downtown area.  I’ll have pictures that I’ll be posting later from there and other places.

Saturday, we took a long drive and got some photos of a old native mounds site and another really neat state park, the name of which eludes me right now…, more photos.  We drove through the old river town of Cairo, Illinois.  I got a couple of shots from the Ohio River, but none from the Cairo.  It seems to be a dying town.

Yesterday, we drove to Starved Rock State Park in north central Illinois.  It seems to be very large.  We’ll be exploring it some tomorrow when the weather will be better.  From there, we’ll be going into Wisconsin on Wednesday.

Hopefully the remnants from this next hurricane will not come back around and go though our area back home.  Everything is so saturated.  Fortunately, we’ve got family, friends, and the neighbors watching and checking the place so we will know right away if there is anything wrong.

While we are traveling, I won’t be checking in as much on all of the feeds that I normally use and won’t be able to comment while we’re traveling.  We will be at a campground starting Wednesday that will have wireless.

At the end of January, I went back to work at the place I retired from as a contractor.  Last Friday was the last day of the contract.

For most of my career, I worked as an operations instructor in nuclear power, both in the Navy (40 months) and at a commercial plant (24 years).  As in many jobs, there was more to it than just the teaching. And, unfortunately, as the company went from a moderate sized utility to a corporation operating the 2nd largest nuclear fleet, there was a lot of additional administrative requirements.

By the time I retired, enjoyment of my job was long gone, except for the small percentage of the time that I actually spent in the classroom. That, combined with a number of administrative burdens and other issues, contributed to my decision to retire when I reached 55.

My plan was to take at least a year off before even considering looking for work.  By the end of the first six months, I had no intentions of actively seeking work.

Work came seeking me a year after my last real day of work.

Not having a job as of the end of next Friday is not a bad thing for me, as some of my few long time readers would know.

You see, I’m retired and this job was just a 7 month contract gig with 4 weeks off in the first half. So, starting next Saturday, I’ll be back to full-time retirement.

The contract job was back at the place I retired from and my office — until next Friday — is three doors down from my old office.  Except for a few weeks here and there, I had worked in the same building from April 1983 until I retired at the end of February 2007.

The last several months have been very fulfilling as I was able to do the parts of the job that I really enjoyed without getting overwhelmed with all of the administrative stuff  that in-house staff has to deal with — the kind of stuff that was part of the reason that I retired when I did.

Today I was walking back to the office with an empty cardboard box for loading up my few personal possessions when I ran into the department manager.  I remarked that there was a lot less accumulation with a 6 month temporary gig than there had been for 24 years as an employee.

She laughed and then said that they could probably find someplace to store it where it would be there waiting for me when I come back for another gig in about 11 months.

Hmmm… take a year off from work, then work for 6 months doing what I enjoy, then eleven months off and come back for another 6 month gig.  Better than working full time, that’s for sure.

Note: the guy in the picture is not me or anyone I am related to.  I was 7 years old when this picture was snapped.