January 15th, halfway through the first month of 2019. Holy shit.
I admit, I let go. Slogging my way through Cisco’s CCNP Certification has been challenging. Some men do it the laid-back, 3-4 year plan. A cert exam once a year. Nice and easy. 90% of the rest, leaving the psychos out, take about two years. Life happens. The exams are very challenging, and increasingly so for version 3 from 2 and 2 from 1. Now, I face “Troubleshooting”, my personal nemesis.
Routing came easy to me. It’s “the big picture”, like me. I understand the history of humanity far better than I understand any one single individual human. Switch, was a bitch. Switching is 90% of mid-to-lower CCNP work, but, I didn’t get it. In some ways, Cisco Switching intimidates me. I can jump on a Brocade or Enterasys and get shit done. With Cisco, everything is a hierarchical cascade of Cisco IOSland. Being that everything, and I do mean “everything” ever invented or written about theoretical and application for switching and routing, including Switches and Routers, came from Cisco, I’m in the right place. Still, I’m not always picking up what Cisco is putting down. Cisco is a lifestyle and I haven’t yet “sold out” to it.
Troubleshooting is like Cisco’s God. Cisco is the Priest and has all the rules and yet, the Priest only glimpses at the vastness and power of its God. Troubleshooting is “MacGyver”. Troubleshooting is magic. It’s the familiarity so close to innateness that, those around you hear the 3 pieces of a 1,000 piece puzzle while you announce the picture the puzzle makes. Troubleshooting is the old Kung-Fu master kicking David Caradine’s ass, and mine.
All this said, it’s January 15th and it’s a Call To Action! Period. The time is now. I just signed up (again) with old faithful, the website of gurus where answers are formed and problems melt to become your skill set. I’ve been on Safaribooksonline since the beginning and now, it’s time to finish the textbook and take the TS 300-135 exam, within one month.
Career. Oil Painting. Spanish (re-learn). Wireshark. Linux. InfoBlox DDI. Somewhere among all this, I’m going to find time to fuck, make new friends, take my dog to the park regularly, row my new inflatable boat, oh and…plan on the NEXT certification path… Life can’t be like a huge 32oz Porterhouse you try and shove down your throat all at once. It’s meant to be cut up into bites, chewed, savored and maybe even re-seasoned to taste. Nothing “good” ever happens on its own. There are always forces and choices and the forces from choices. If we want “good”, we have to make good. Good forces and good choices. And then, hope like hell we were right. Oh yeah. I fell off my diet, too. Damn it. Keto…Take two. *Chop*.
Ah! Damn it! Almost forgot. Oil Painting Palette. Ten years in the making, knew that I wanted 12 colors. I’m also heavily into Astrology. Just could NOT surrender certain (I thought) mandatory colors. Tonight, after spending some time online with an educated, very polite, gregarious Russian girl, I’ve found my 12 permanent “Lord Scorpius’ Palette” colors:
Flake White mixed with Zinc white
Cadmium Yellow Light, Cadmium Yellow Medium, Burnt Umber
Pyrrole Red Light, Pyrrole Red Medium (Bright Red)
Alizarin Crimson, Dioxazine Violet
Cobalt Blue, UltraMarine, Thalo Teal
Thalo Yellow-Green, Olive Green
There they are: 1-12 perfection incarnate!
Merréll's Goal 2019 and Beyond 