Failed attempt

Ok, so I thought I would have stuff to write about. It's not that there isn't anything going on in my life, just that it's probably not interesting to read about. So once again, this blog slips into retirement. Later!

The end of summer already?

I've started to feel it... the temps are slowly dropping. It gets pretty chilly at night. I'm sure we'll still have some more scorchers before the end of the season, but it won't be many... In unrelated news, I'm really excited for the ski/snowboard season this year. Not sure why. Maybe because I didn't spend many days at the beach this year, so I'm anxious to cut my losses and move on to the next season. Fall? Not so much. I'm a summer/winter kinda guy. I'll survive fall, but once that snow starts accumulating, I'm a happy man :)

Others

Just heard a great quote from last night's Colbert Report from Dick Meyer: "You couldn't find a worse recipe for human happiness than worrying about yourself first. Basically, a better path to life, a better path to contentment, a better path to being a citizen is to think about other people first. " So take some time today and specifically focus on making someone else happier.

I almost closed with "...making someone else happier. That will make you happier. And that's what it's all about." But I wasn't sure my sarcasm would come through in writing...

Emotion in Email

I've heard countless times that we have to be careful what we write in e-mail and text messages because emotion doesn't carry through in writing. Seriously? To the people making this claim: Have you ever read a book? Did you understand the emotion that the writer was trying to portray? Why is e-mail and text messaging any different? I think that we don't need to be saying "Be careful of what you write," rather: "Be careful HOW you write." We all know that email and texting has made it ridiculously easy to send a quick message to someone(s) else and it has been lamented many times that we need to read what we are writing before sending. It's true, but this doesn't mean that we have to remove emotion from our messages. I think we just need to learn how to properly put it in to our messages. The general train of thought is that since it's so easy to send a message, it must also make it easy to send a poorly written message. Doesn't it also stand to reason that is easier to send a well written message? I'm not talking about proper grammer, good spelling, or any of those sorts of things (although those are always nice to have), but rather complete thoughts that properly convey the message and the emotion that you intend to convey. Re-reading if we have to, but really just thinking about what we are writing, and (maybe) more importantly, thinking about who is reading and how it will be read. That's all I'm driving at :) Now give me a second to go back and re-read this before I hit post...

Return to posting...

Well, for some reason the writing bug has bitten me once again, and so I've chosen this medium to post to. I also have started using twitter (www.twitter.com/brettfitzgerald), so you can also follow me there for more frequent microblogs, when I remember that I have a twitter account.

So big news in the past two years since my last post. I just got married two weeks ago to the most wonderful woman on the planet! Jamie and I met in Germany, dated about a year, got engaged and on the 26th of July got married in Vermont. Beautiful wedding in the mountains. We live in Saginaw for the time being, but once she finishes her last semester of school we're hoping to move to Hawaii for a year. We both love to travel and have adventuresome personalities, so Hawaii seems to fit both criteria (and I REALLY want to learn to surf).

Jamie and I spent this past weekend in Grand Haven, doing a little beach work to prepare for our reception. We also got to spend some time with friends, which was nice. Now we're back to work. I'm working with Intuitive Software, doing web development work while Jamie is working at a hospital in Midland. We both love our jobs, which is a blessing. Speaking of work, I should probably get back to mine. More to come in the next days!