I was full time remote from March 2020 through April 2022. I loved it. My employer started bringing people back in the office then with our policy expecting people in the office at least three days a week. At the time I grumbled a little, but once in the office I found value in being here rather than home. Not value to the company, value to what I want out of my career.

I think our policy is reasonable. We're a small enough company the individual relationships are significant. It also provides flexibility. Need to be home to let a plumber in? Just do it, no need to even inform your boss other than letting them know you'll be on Teams not in a meeting room.

The most important thing about our policy is it's been consistent. It's what they were saying for months before being implemented, and it's been unchanged ever since. I can plan my life around this.

My old job went to full remote. I've talked to people there who are all-in on remote, and one joked if they bring people back to the office he'll be looking for a job, and I believe him. I talked to another guy who said he's usually in the office and it's odd having a mix of people he sees every day and people, including his staff, who he never sees. I think they'll start bringing people back and create a lot of angst because of the change.

After change, I think people are upset that salaries are up 2% while corporate profits are up 8% with inflation of 5%.

Build power plants and power lines. It's century old technology limited by politics and public acceptance.

From the comments:

There is a certain class of manager (all too common) that will assume something does not exist if you can’t see it on a management report or a balance sheet. Innovative engineers in particular shun that type of thinking, and that’s why that line of thought drives them away. That type of manager will always nurture mediocrity as a result.

"Nurturing mediocrity" is exactly what my old company was doing. In 2018 they announced there would be staff reductions but no layoffs. They would cut staff through natural turnover. As people leave, they just wouldn't backfill.

On their management reports, all staff was equally good. But reality was the mediocre employees know they have a good thing going while the great ones see it's going to get bad and start looking around.

Management said they wanted to avoid the hurt feelings of layoffs which can happen even among those who are kept. But they lost an opportunity to cut mediocre staff and created years of discontent among all employees.

On the job front, I think every sub-group in my department has a vacancy. That's probably six vacancies in a department of ~30. I left my old job six months ago. My old vacancy is still posted.

As long as I'm skimming my old employer's career page, I see they have vacancies listed for positions they laid off 18 months ago. With the job market the way it is, it's time for corporate execs to actually look at employee survey results. They won't, though.

I put an offer on a house last week at $105k over what they paid in 2018 plus liability for a pending assessment for road improvements around $12k. Didn't get it.

I'm seeing a house tomorrow. I think it's time to move from my condo to my own four walls. The market is nuts but that'll make selling my condo easier. I don't want to deal with trying to rent it out. My association has limits on that. Not prohibitions but limits, and I just don't think I'd be good at it.

It really is, but that confidence comes with practice. I was faster on the bike descents in the race than I was the first time I rode them. I've tried hiking faster, too. I used to always try to take the ideal step rather than the fastest one. It was exhausting because I'd pause constantly. I started to look at it as taking the easiest step down unless there was no safe one. I got better with it with time.

I don't know that there's a way to practice muddy descents, though. I mean you can but it's still just a mud hole.

I think I'd be great at being retired. I'd do the things I do now outside of work during the day and have evenings to relax. Go swim at 8 am when the pool is less busy with the morning swimmers off to work. Stop at a coffee shop for coffee and a scone, then go out for a 2-3 hour bike ride. Have a lunch and a nap, then go for a walk before dinner. After, read for a bit or watch a movie and head to bed.

Or on other days, drive to any of a number of nature areas and hike all morning. Or as long as I can, run the trails.

I'd be great at being retired, but none of the things I do would earn extra money. It would be all cash out on gym memberships and bikes and cars and gas. I'd love to travel again to hike when the pandemic is more under control.

I shaved my legs Sunday. I'd never done it. The larger surface area compared to my face is tedious, and the backs of my thighs are hard to be sure are done well. But the hair is much softer than my beard and seems much easier to shave.

Related: triathlon number 4 for the summer is Sunday. I shaved my legs for the aerodynamic advantage, and yes I'm serious. The bike course is mostly pretty flat and I'm hoping to maintain some good speed. This race is Olympic distance of 1500 m swim, 40 km bike, 10 km run. It'll be my second Olympic but I think overall an easier course. I'm hoping to come in under three hours.

I'm taking a rest day today. I really need it. I might call in sick Friday for a mental health day, maybe go hike somewhere local. I needed that earlier this week but had a bunch of meetings. I probably should have just called out of all of those.

Remote work also has expanded the recruiting pool for rival companies and technology firms, making employees with digital skills ripe for poaching by employers nationwide, Ms. Patterson said.

I keep telling my dad this. He used to own a small business and seems shocked at the possibility of long term work remote. "How do you know people are working?" It doesn't matter. If they aren't getting work done, who cares if it's because they're working 5 hours a day instead of 8 or working the full day but just poor performers? What if someone is doing great work and doing it in 5 hours? Is that so bad?

Companies able to make it work will have a bigger talent pool available. For myself, I have a few key criteria for anywhere I might live. Nowhere desert, for one. But if a company in Arizona said I could work remote, suddenly they become an option for me.

It's a single data point, but a coworker got J&J and said he was wrecked the next day.

"They dug out the bow but somehow it's 'still stuck.' Pretty fishy."

There was a pro triathlon last Friday, and the local favorite took third! It was an extremely solid field, though one competitor tested COVID positive and couldn't compete. The field was a lot of the best of the best. Not only did she take third but was the fastest American, beating two other world-class Americans.

She started the run in eighth and ran down five women to get third. One does not simply run five pro triathletes into the ground without a fight. It's part of what's exciting about triathlon. One can be a great swimmer, good cyclist, and good runner leading going into the run, and a good swimmer, good cyclist, and great runner will run past you with nothing you can do.

A coworker sometimes uses the phrase "off the reservation" to mean "straying away from the company line." I finally said something to him yesterday, privately, pointing out it's probably an offensive term that refers to forcing Native Americans onto reservations. It's so easy to use offensive idioms, but not realizing it's bad doesn't make it ok. I found an article on NPR from a Native American (whose tribe is even in my company's service territory) who considers it offensive. While other terms are worse, like the Washington football team, he noted less offensive terms signal to people it's ok to use the more offensive ones.

Here are some more vintage suggestions:

1964: XB-70 Valkyrie

1965: Super Guppy

1966: M2-F2

1967: Mini Guppy

1968: C-5 Galaxy

1969: Concorde

1970: F-14 Tomcat

1971: VAK 191B

1972: A-10 Thunderbolt II

1973: AVE Mizar

1974: B-1 Lancer

1975: YC-15

1976: YC-14

1977: Shuttle Carrier Aircraft

1978: F/A-18 Hornet

1979: MD-80 (sorry 1979ers)

My opinion? This is Enron 2.0. Enron manipulated California markets by artificially withholding or limiting generation capacity. Texas learned their lesson. The lesson wasn't "don't manipulate energy markets," what they learned was "change the rules so the market collapses to your advantage."

Energy markets are a little out of my experience, but I understand the market is supposed to pay the marginal price to everyone. If the market is humming along at $20/MWh and needs more power, it looks for the next cheapest available unit. Maybe that unit has bid in at $21/MWh. It get turned on and everyone gets paid $21 instead of $20. What I'd like to know is, what unit drove a $9000 price? Is that bid realistic?

In my part of the country we saw prices around $700-$800. A bargain against $9000 in ERCOT, sure, but much more than typical $20-$40.

Why the difference? Gas price. So, was selling $2/MMBTU gas for $500/MMBTU a real reflection of cost, or was it price gouging? I suspect gas market rules allow for this kind of gouging.

The markets need to change.

Using MMBTU also needs to change because has there ever been a more antiquated measurement system? MM is million because M is the Roman numeral for thousand, so MM is thousand-thousand.

I started using a tail light at the end of the 2020 season, and anecdotally it seemed like cars gave me more space. I don't know if it's the improved visibility or awareness, but I'm certainly a convert. I'll use the light all the time and will look for a good front light, too.

I don't know anyone who's been killed. Locally (maybe everywhere, not sure) people will put white painted "ghost" bikes where fatalities have occurred, and I can think of several around town.

Thanks, I really appreciate it! What you describe sounds spot-on, except for two things I see differently in my case:

1. Gossip: I don't really hear much gossip, even pre-COVID. Sort of, everyone knows who isn't very good and jokes about it in private. Though I suppose that's gossip. Most of us are engineers and at least a little introverted.

2. HR: In my case I think HR is interested because maximizing efficiency is in the company's interest. I realize maximizing efficiency isn't the same thing as individual happiness or satisfaction, but I think HR is still essentially "on my side." Not that they're not on the side of management, just they may accept my side of the coin.

I've actually done the "who are the group leaders" exercise because fundamentally my complaint is my direct supervisor is not a leader. He's probably the sixth or seventh person I'd think of leading the group after me, two others in our group, my supervisor's boss, and two former group members who took positions in another area (but that we still engage with all the time).

About the other two in my group: one is a maybe. He's the second most senior after me, and he's very capable, but he's fairly quiet in meetings. Not silent, but he never really leads a conversation. The other has only been at the company two years, and prior to being here he was in the military. He spent ~20 years being an officer, and I see the leadership in him. But he's also pretty new to everything we do. He picks it up fast, but he still has a lot to gain before he can lead a discussion.

Which feels like it leaves most of the group leadership to me, but my boss's boss is very clear about only wanting to engage with my boss, not me. My boss's boss and I used to have a good working relationship, but it's really eroded. He hired my boss into the leadership position, and the best I can come up with is he feels he needs to make it work to cover his mistake and feeling like he owes it to my boss. Which is sort of single person gossip, I guess.

I have a wood-chipper pillow. I like it. Mine is "Coop Home Goods" brand and I got it on Amazon years ago. It took me several tries to get a pillow I liked because Amazon's search optimization steered me toward a lot of junk. Better customer unfriendly searches and worker abuse than supporting fascism, though.

I'm really sorry about the loss of Kathlyn. She must have been an incredible friend.

I think your feelings and your introspection are healthy. My cat Max passed away in April of 2019, and it was just me and Tess for a while. She and Max never really got along, but I could tell she was lonely. So Hugo came home.

Hugo isn't Max, and I still miss him. I sometimes still ask Tess if she remembers him (but being a cat she doesn't answer). Hugo is curled up in my legs currently, and he's a nice boy. But I still miss Max.

Bringing him home came from a good place, and I'm sure you're right that getting kittens will be for you, too. I always like to think my cats wish they could still be here but are glad another cat in need has a home.

This is Trump's legacy.

I made pizza again yesterday. Yeast proofed right, no waiting for anything to rise, and: delicious!

I'm definitely getting the hang of adding the right amount of flour. That was a problem the first time or two. I didn't skimp on cheese, either, which was good.

I'm still using sauce I bought. I think next I'll have to try to make sauce. I did include chopped habaneros I grew myself which was great.

Thanks for the recipe! It's really good.

I made homemade pizza on Sunday, which really means homemade crust with sauce, cheese, and toppings I bought. It isn't worthy enough of its own #breadwatch post, but I have two more yeast packets I'll need to use up. I'll either try pizza again or maybe something else? I'm open to suggestions.

I'm working tomorrow and next Monday, then I'm off from 12/15 through 1/3. It's probably the longest continuous stretch of time off from work since I started. I wish I was traveling somewhere, and if it was just me to worry about I might. But I don't want to ask someone to check on my cats during a pandemic. I don't want to ask them to increase their risk, and I realize it increases my risk, too. I'm going to try to cover more of the Ice Age Trail, probably trail running some but maybe hiking, too. The closest segments I haven't done are at least 90 minutes away, so I can't do that every day because the driving would be super annoying. I'll try to finish a couple books I have around. I'm halfway through Cloud Atlas, and I know I have White Fang here.

I have a broken tube amp that's been partially repaired for years. This might be enough time to finally try to see if my fix worked.

I'm open to suggestions for hobbies to try.

My condolences to you and your family.

The simplest example of this, to me, is pro cyclists. They use the lightest bikes possible, and it's because every push, every grade takes less energy. Ride a heavy bike and it will wear you down over time more than a lighter bike.

Wisconsin looks pretty good, too. Might be a good time to buy land in the UP. By 2045 when I want to retire Marquette might be a great place to live year round.

Not meaning to denigrate Marquette today, though.

Do people like Spotify? I'm thinking about trying it but don't love the idea of another monthly expense.

They're great for getting benefits programs set up, making sure that the company's health plan is competitive

That's a higher opinion of HR than I have. They're good at telling people the health plan is competitive, but is it really? It's too complicated to really understand. As for the benefits program, how hard is it to fill out some forms at Fidelity? I've never tried, but I bet it isn't hard. And while HR set these up, HR doesn't actually understand them and absolutely cannot explain them.

Otherwise, yes. If one got to the in-person interview, they think you can do the work. The one that gets hired is the one they think will fit best with the company and coworkers and not the one who best knows the specific details of the work.

I bought a wetsuit (ping wasoxygen). Tonight will be my first swim in it, though I've rented similar ones.

On Sunday I went and watched a triathlon like the one I'll be doing in a month. Someone died. "Medical issue during the swim not being treated as a drowning" is all they've said. It's spooky to think about. I may have watched him walk into the water as he had less than ten minutes left. He was 59.

I also went to the visitation for the spouse of a coworker last week. She was 49.

I'm going to wear my tri shorts tonight and maybe do a mini aquathon and run after. It's global running day or something.

I'm seeing Paul McCartney tomorrow.

If you have questions in the Adirondack High Peaks, hit me up. I've finished the 46ers and am going back in two weeks to hike some in pursuit of a winter 46er badge.

My mom would say "that's just one more thing to wash!" Meaning I'm too lazy to wash stuff."

That's a compelling argument for adding onions to my dinner. I like onions fine, I'm just a little too lazy to cut them up. It isn't a compelling argument to make an onion/strawberry smoothie, though.