Workaholic

Anyone who has known me for any extended length of time knows that I work...a lot. Since I was a little kid, work always found me. There was always extra credit to be done and lawyers who needed their dog walked for more money than I had any right to earn at my age. The trend really didn't change as I got older. In Canada I was a TO and judge for Magic tournaments (which didn't exist at my location until I moved there and started them). When I cam back to the USA I volunteered for The Company and did an enormous amount of work while still judging Magic tournaments, studying Aikido, and pursuing my Ph.D. I eventually burned out and left The Company and Aikido, but then I became a Board member of my soccer club and started Vs judging on a regular basis (while continuing to judge Magic and also build a judging community).

I was doing fairly well until Chicago. That trip totally killed me financially as I footed the bill entirely by myself and didn't budget properly (hey, I'm not used to paying my own way). So, upon my return I found myself taking on additional odd jobs to earn more money. It worked well, but some of the projects are ongoing (staffing and promoting GP-NJ for next month). In addition, my parents are moving (the final move date is October 24th) and all my stuff is here with me in the city. Getting the time to sell my years of accumulation has been really hard (if I get a free weekend and consider doing something fun, I quickly remember that I've got tons of stuff to eBay. Drat.).

I fear I simply do too much. There are plenty of people that work crazy hours, but it's usually just their one job. For me, it feels like I'm working 3-4 full-time jobs. The other night I wondered what would happen if I just stopped doing my non-Ph.D. work. I would have all this free time. What would I do? Sadly, I would probably just seek out more work.

Near Miss

Most of you probably don't know exactly where I work (Mount Sinai is between 99th and 100th on Madison) and I'm sure none of you know that I do a fair bit of work at the Hospital for Special Surgery on 71st and York. The arrow in the picture points to this second home for me, only a block away from where a pilot lost control of his place and crashed into the side of a building today. I normally walk by that building on my way back home and could have had some wreckage come crashing down on me if the timing were a bit different. Hayden 1, Crazy World 0.