Surfing Sand Dunes?

Alas, a change of pace! A topic to write on and a new step in my life... A BRAND NEW CARRR! Well, a van; a utility van that has my company's name on the side. I'm still excited. So excited, that I'm tired by 5pm today. It's tiring trying to break a van in with car-dancing on the hour drive to Crestview and back, completely worth it though. My 2011 E-150 is actually very nice, and a gas card that lets me fill 'er up on the company's dime is muy excelente. There's enough space for a hammock in that thing!... *sidenote: I may or may not put up a hammock in my van. ...ok... yeah i did that.

I'm truly excited about outfitting the auto, as I get a day's worth of fun organizing activity. If you know me, you know I'll thoroughly enjoy this, no sarcasm. Continuity hasn't been my strong point in the series of blogposts I write, but I'm going to step it up. I've been researching different cities that have branches of Siemens, and wish I could easily decide on just one. The van wouldn't come with me, but in another city I'd get a new vehicle all over again. The true deciding factors are things like: quantity and quality of soccer leagues, weather, urban sprawl, presence of mountains and/or surf, job openings (obviously), and dog-friendliness. These ideas spawn very strange daydreams. Imagining myself as a field electrician in Cornella de Llobregat, Spain; or a field specialist in Perth, Australia; or (better yet) a wind power sales manager in Cairo...
Pictured below is Catalan Bay... where I COULD be wiring HVAC controls and such.



These aren't quite daydreams as much as they are career options now. All of these are real jobs in my field, at my company. Siemens is so widespread that it hurts to think about. After three years, my options become unlimited, as almost all the positions need an employee that's been three years with the company. I had a huge yearning to become a military man, but that's all but vanished. My dad was one, his dad was one, and I'm going Gaga-breakout ridiculous (within my family anyway) if I don't serve. I was born this way baby.

Dream Big

I've been bit. The traveling bug has got me in the rear end, and it seems like life has gotten stagnant in this dreadful pretty beach town. Last summer I visited Japan, and the west coast of the states, and my mom took me on a cruise to a bunch of Caribbean islands for her honeymoon. I don't know why it erks me to know I'm not going anywhere this summer, but I have got to plan something. My mindset isn't normally like this, and actually was the opposite growing up. I hated traveling because my mom took me to different countries (what felt like) every weekend. It's different now, and the circumstances are far from what I had growing up. I'm beginning to need that escape, or at least a plan to escape; however, with a new job that I've locked myself into it will be hard to just up and go. This brings me to my dream last night. I had moved to a city in the west, had no friends, and everything was new and different. I'd like that. The beers are taken seriously, the people are nicer, and there aren't God-fearing hippocrats yelling at me. The branch I work at is extremely small, and we are all supposed to be jack-of-all-trades kind of guys. My boss expects a lot, but rewards a lot. Most branches of Siemens don't care about personal progress nearly as much as this guy, and after three months on the job he's talking to me about becoming a technician. The end goal for getting the job as an electronic installer initially was to make money. Now it's shifted, it has become my vessel of escape, a moneymaker, a lifestyle. I don't know about making this my life quite yet, but I may start visiting other branches in other cities nearby so I can acquire some other opinions and compare the type of work and parameters they run. I could eventually be doing specialist technician work in Canada, Germany, China, Greece or Japan. The highest amount of offices is in New York, Texas, New Jersey and Arizona. Those would be the easiest places to transfer to, but I'd like someplace new. I've been in New York so many summers that it wouldn't be a big change for me, and New Jersey isn't the most magical place in the world. Texas is a huge opportunity due to what they have: windmills! Very cool, and another blog-worthy idea. The place I move could easily be California, Germany or Canada too. All of those locations have crazy amounts of offices and opportunity. (And they're all freakin' sweet.) Originally I was depressed and tore up that so many of my friends graduated with a Bachelor's and I haven't yet. I know now everything happens for a reason. If I moved to a city with a Siemens Wind Power graduates' course, and focused on the technical side of these awesome machines; I could get my BS with a purpose. (Something a lot of my friends never thought out, a BS with no purpose is just ...well... bulls***) It's a long dream away, but it's the first thing I've ever been motivated towards in the career world. Did I mention Siemens pays for college programs when you're already an employee for period of time? :)
Give me two years: