So I'm struck by a strange notion. Maybe I'll go to graduate school and get a degree in construction management (or a variation on that theme). I shepherded the agency I work for through relocation, includeing a $400k gut renovation of 5000 square feet of derelict building (the place now looks great). Working with architects and contractors was a great experience. I like architectural design. I was once pretty awed by this guy who told me that he had built over 200 buildings. Could I escape from the world of work while I went to grad school, or would I have to go part time?

Being a Construction Manager sounds sort of like my plumber ideal. I've always wanted a job like a plumber. Everybody needs a plumber at some point. Most plumbers work for themselves. They are able to charge a pretty good fee for what they do. It's secure, independent, and (relatively) mobile. I'd really like to be an architect, but that seems to be such a crowded field, and I'm a little old to embark on that course.

I'm 37 years old and I still don't know what I want to be when I grow up. I blame my Dad! He had an odd idiosyncracy. When, as a lad, I would amble up to him and report, "When I grow up, I want to be a veterinarian (or architect, or lawyer, or teacher, or commercial artist, or whatever)," his response was the same. Discouraging in the utmost. "No no no. They're a dime a dozen. You'll never make a living that way. You don't want to do that." This from a man who is essentially a frustrated poultry farmer. Poultry farming was always his ambition in life. He went to college (National Farm School then, now Delaware Valley Agricultural College in Doylestown, Pennsylvania) as a Poultry Management Major. Unfortunately, factory farming was already replacing family farming. He ended up as a Food Inspector for the Pennsylvania Department of Agriculture. Not at all a bad living.

Love my Dad. Overall, he did a great job (twice widowed, twice remarried, brought up the three of us pretty well), but that's one thing he could have done better.

Over and out for today.