Tag: job search

Fireworks

Happy 1st of July – have the fireworks started in your neighborhood yet? They were non-stop here over the weekend. Lucky for me, neither of my cats care?

Fireworks have been around for around 4,000 years! The first firecrackers were made in China by throwning bamboo stalks into a fire. Air pockets in the bamboo overheated and resulted in a small BANG as they exploded. The Chinese believed this warded off evil spirits.

But naturally, this BANG wasn’t enough so according to Chinese legend, an alchemist mixed saltpeter, sulfur and charcoal – making a crude version of gun powder – and then filled paper tubes with the mixture while inserting a fuse. Much bigger BANG! And we’ve been off to the races for the biggest bang and the prettiest explosion ever since.

This link will tell you more about the evolution of fireworks – and will allow you to amaze your friends with fun facts at 4th of July celebrations this week! https://ssec.si.edu/stemvisions-blog/evolution-fireworks

Have a great time at the fireworks shows this week! My town isn’t having a display this year so I’m looking for a good show locally – but there’s always the Macy’s 4th of July Fireworks Show on TV or the Boston Pops if I can’t find one!

Dengue Fever?

My local news had a story about Dengue Fever on the rise in regions where it isn’t common. So something new to think about for those of us who mosquitoes find delicious? I really believe that if there is a mosquito within a square mile of me, it will bite me! So how worried do we need to be?

Dengue is on the rise – the theory being that rising temperatures are responsible for the spread. So far this year, Puerto Rico has had nearly 1,500 cases (out of a population of around 3.2 million people) with an additional 700-ish cases in all other US states/territories. Last year for the full year, the US had a reported 3,036 cases. So halfway through the year, we’re already over 70% of the cases of last year.

In Latin America, the incidence of Dengue is nearly double what it was a year ago. So Dengue is definitely on the rise, but what is it? And can it be treated?

This from NBC News:

The most common symptom among those who contract the mosquito-borne disease is fever. Other symptoms include serious headaches, nausea, vomiting, rash and body pain.

Symptoms can be mild or severe. Most dengue fever patients recover in a week, but in severe cases the disease can be life-threatening and require hospitalization since it can result in shock, internal bleeding and even death.

Those who have had dengue in the past are more likely to develop severe symptoms. A person can get sick with dengue fever up to four times in their lifetime — once for each type of virus that can cause the disease, according to the CDC.

Outbreaks have been reported in Florida, Texas and Hawaii in addition to Puerto Rico – so if you’re headed to those states, be mindful of using mosquito repellent, wearing long sleeves/long pants or staying inside to avoid mosquito bites.

And as always, make sure you are mosquito aware and take care to drain standing water where mosquitos can breed!

https://www.healthdirect.gov.au/dengue-fever

Financial Review

I spent the morning today with my Financial Advisor. I hadn’t really taken a good look at my investment account in well over six years. Sure I checked in on it and it’s been making money for me – but I hadn’t looked at the investment allocations in a seriously long time. And given all the changes in the markets since Covid – not to mention retirement is planned for 6 years from now – it was time to take a good hard look at it.

I’ve always been a “live within my means” kind of person. What I didn’t spend from my paycheck got put into savings and then I ignored it. Same with my 401K money from all the jobs from my past. I consolidated 401Ks a few years ago and then quickly ignored that as well. I had a stock inheritance from my Grandmother and when I got it, I set up my account to put all the dividends back into additional stock share and – you guessed it – ignored it too. It’s been a good strategy for me. I carry very little debt other than my mortgage and I’ve always had savings. But as retirement starts to look like more of reality, I want to be sure I don’t outlive my savings.

So the visit with my Financial Advisor was a good one. We tweaked my investment account choices and I’m going to consider some more account consolidation. If you haven’t started planning for retirement yet, let me just say it’s never too soon.

I always signed up for the 401K plan everywhere I worked – but I wish I would have talked to a Financial Advisor when I was in my 20s to have had a better savings/investment plan. According to the figures we went through today, I’m in a good place – but I still live in terror of outliving my savings. Comes with being unmarried maybe?

But if you haven’t started planning – it’s time to start. Even if you don’t have a pile of cash sitting around anywhere, having a personal budget/plan for your finances is a good thing. I use an investment advisor at Chase but there are all kinds of advisors out there. Here’s some links that can help you get started:

WiFi 7 is here!

Remember last week when I posted about WiFi 6? Well – turns out WiFi 7 was actually launched in January 2024 so I was behind the times. But I was doing a little light reading (LOL) about WiFi over the weekend and read about WiFi 7! No worries – it’ll take some time before routers/devices are all ready for it so you haven’t missed anything yet.

WiFi 7 adds yet another band for speed – 6GHz. So new routers coming to market will be tri-band. Your WiFi enabled devices will still work with WiFi 7 but may not be able to access all the speed available. One of the driving forces behind WiFi 7 is the number of VR devices coming online so the third band of spectrum will make more space – and speed – needed for them.

I realize not all of you will be as fascinated with WiFi as I am but here are some articles about WiFi 7 that will explain it better than I can!

What did you want to be when you grew up?

I’ve been daydreaming about what my life might have been like if I had chosen a different career path. Not that I have regrets about the path I took – except maybe that Walgreens laid me off! I’ve had a really great career so far. I’ve had a lot of fun, made some great friends and learned a lot so I can’t ask for a lot more.

But when I was in high school, I wanted to be a physical therapist. I was a candy stripe volunteer at the hospital where my Dad worked and I worked transport for the PT department. I got to see a lot of great work between taking patients to/from their rooms and I really wanted to make that kind of difference in patient outcomes. But then life happened and the college I wanted to go to became out of the question. So I started college at the Ohio State University branch campus, wrote a term paper for my English class on advertising and I was hooked on that!

Once I got to NYC and was working on Madison Avenue, one of my friends transferred out of media planning/buying and went into the TV production department. I remember being jealous at the time – it looked like so much fun! But I couldn’t afford the pay cut to make that move so I stayed in media. Choices right?

Media led to Field Marketing with Wendy’s, my move to Chicago and then my move to the client side. I have loved (almost) every minute of it! I’ve always said I never really had a career plan – but the right people and opportunities have always presented themselves when I needed them. I’m hoping my next new opportunity comes along soon!

What did you want to be and where did you end up? Tell YOUR story in the comments!

HOT!!!!!

This is the fourth day in a row of 90 degree plus heat where I live. And quite frankly, I’m tired of heat/humidity. I don’t like humidity – it makes it hard for me to breathe. So I’m sticking to AC spaces and limiting my time outside. But I’m lucky – I don’t have to be outside. What if you do?

Here’s some tips for keeping cool:

  • Wear loose, light colored clothing. Cotton is good and so are clothes made out of Dry-Fit cloth – they wick the sweat away from you.
  • Try to stay out of the sun if you can. Create shade using an umbrella or canopy if you can. And don’t forget the sunscreen! A sunburn will only dehydrate you more and make you feel hotter.
  • Hydrate, hydrate, hydrate! Water is best but sports drinks are good too. Just avoid sugary, caffeinated drinks if you can. That goes for alcoholic beverages too.
  • Use a spray bottle with water to cool your skin. I heard yesterday adding a couple drops of peppermint oil to the water in a spray bottle will enhance the cooling effect as well. Take a cool shower. Or hit the pool!
  • Watch for signs of heat exhaustion or heatstroke. Here’s a handy link for that: https://www.cdc.gov/niosh/topics/heatstress/heatrelillness.html

Or just stay in the AC if you can! Hope this heat wave breaks soon!

Water, water, everywhere!

Yesterday, the Village sent a plumber to replace the water meter in my house. What should have been a 20 minute thing, snowballed into calling my own plumber and having the Village Public Works department at my house for 5 hours to get my water working correctly again. And I also had to have my hot water heater replaced. So it was a fun day! (or not….)

But I did learn a lot about hot water heaters and thought I would take this opportunity to share. My last hot water heater was installed in 2008. And typically, a hot water heater needs to be replaced every 8-12 years depending on the design of the unit, water quality and quality of the install. I was apparently very lucky given how my old unit was installed to have gotten 16 years of service from it!

My home did not have lever shut off valves in the places they should be. Local plumbing code says there should be a water shut off before the water meter, after the water heater – and for pure expediency there should be one for the hot water heater as well. My home only had 1 working valve shut off. And of course it broke when the Village plumber turned the water back on after replacing the meter. Thus starting my adventure in plumbing yesterday – but I digress. I was going to write about hot water heaters.

I bet you don’t think much about how your hot water works. I know I didn’t! There is a lot to consider when you get a new hot water heater like:

  • Natural gas or electric? My old one was gas and the new one is too.
  • Tank size? Typically, they are 40 or 50 gallons. My plumbers recommended a new “skinny” 40 gallon tank for me. But depending on the size of your family and your hot water needs, you may want to consider a different tank size. There are a bunch of charts online if you search that can help you figure out what you need for your home – but I think working with your plumber might be the best way to figure out what you really need.
  • Can you go tankless? My HOA rules require approval to do tankless – so even though I’d like the extra space, I ruled this out really fast due to the approval process. But tankless also requires different venting than a traditional hot water heater – and my plumbers say they need a lot of regular maintenance. So glad I didn’t go this route.
  • Who is going to install it? I didn’t have a plumber before yesterday so the first thing I did was look for recommendations on my town’s Facebook page. Luckily, people ask for recommendations on plumbers regularly there so it was just a matter of searching the recos and I found a local company that was highly recommended multiple times. And BOY were those recommendations right – the plumber I called came right away and didn’t price gouge me either. The two guys that came to my house were just terrific – they know the code for the area and they were great problem solvers.

So I’m all set now for at least 8-12 years of hot showers, clean clothes and clean dishes. It sure was an adventure – complete with the smoke detectors going off twice, the Village Public Works team digging a large hole in my front yard to replace the water shut off from the water main, and oh yeah record heat! But all in all, I learned a lot about plumbing and I have water so it’s all good!

Back to normal!

So over the weekend, Xfinity came and replaced my router with a new – more secure – one. So with EVERYTHING changed clear down to my IP address, I’m feeling back to normal after my brush with the hacker.

My NEW router!

I’d encourage all of you to talk with your internet provider and make sure your equipment is up to date. Turns out my old router wasn’t as secure as I would have hoped – even before my stupidity in falling for a hack. It was well over 5 years old – and with the way tech goes, that’s ancient! The new one has a new layer of security in the hardware and other bells and whistles that I hope will keep me protected now.

Did you know the first WiFi router was introduced for regular consumers in 1997? Seems strange that they’ve only been in common use for less than 30 years doesn’t it? If you got your router in 2019 or before, odds are it isn’t giving you all the speed/capacity all the devices in your house want. In 2019, the standard for changed from WiFi 5 to WiFi 6 – resulting in a speed increase of almost 300%! The new WiFi 6 standard also introduced the 5GHz band in addition to the 2.4GHz band which WiFi had been limited too – so less congestion for devices in addition to more speed. I counted up all the internet connected devices in my house over the weekend – I live alone and I currently have over 30 devices attached to WiFi in my house! Imagine how many more devices you have now than you had 5 years ago and you get yet another reason to check the equipment you use for WiFi and make sure it’s up to date.

The job search is heating up (with the weather?) too! Last week, I had an informal interview for a role that isn’t even posted yet! The hiring manager heard about me as a result of interviewing well for a job I didn’t get. I have a couple other things moving too – so keep your fingers crossed!