John Burkholder

Some days can be interesting when it comes to conversations. Today, a coworker whipped out a checkbook that he carries with him...in the city...of Chicago. I have been racking my brain trying to remember the last time I used a checkbook or even where one is located right now if I needed it.   Who takes checks? Are they still accepted? Doesn’t everyone use their debit card? I am just trying to imagine being at the grocery store when he rips out his stash of coupons and his checkbook. The coupons are fine. Save money. That’s why they exist. But the checkbook? Really? I would definitely be the guy standing right behind him waiting to pay for my one loaf of bread. Do grocery store registers still have a scanner for checks?  Then I get in the elevator to go home and someone asked me how my day was. I respond with my usual “great”. He then retorts with “I guess my threshold for great is higher than yours.”  Have you ever seen “the LEGO movie”? Well, that “everything is awesome

I remember the exact night my insomnia started. I remember thinking it was cool to see the TV static after the Star Spangled Banner played. I remember noticing the cable TV channels at the time were still played. But now I can tell it is finally starting to affect me. I notice my threshold for how long I can go without sleep has shortened. Going from 2 hours within 72 hours to 4 hour minimum within 72 hours. I can feel my heart beating heavily when I reach that point I need to shut down. My brain gets foggy and my physical abilities are shaky, and often miss targets. People know about it. I receive all kinds of suggestions and look for patterns of good sleep over no sleep. I have tried prescriptions, natural remedies, meditation, herbals, no blue light, no screens, no caffeine, no sugar, etc. you name it, I have tried it over the many years of fighting it. Do I ever sleep? Yes. My body will sometimes correct itself if I am sick, if I don’t sleep over a couple weeks, or even if

I decided I need a hobby. This is actually a first for me. Normally, I am so wrapped up in technology solutions and researching how to bring that into my job, I would feel my hobby is technology. But my wife is right…shh, don’t tell her. I need some sort of hobby outside my normal day to day activity. I need something interesting. So I decided I need to research this using a website: http://nextluxury.com/mens-lifestyle-advice/top-75-best-manly-hobbies-for-men/ . There are certain items in the list that interest me. Now I just need to figure out what is best for a city dweller like me in a small apartment. Some I am going to skip because “that is just ridiculous”! Cooking and grilling: I do like to cook. Grilling is a bit of a challenge, but this is an option. Chess: yes. I do like chess and I am fairly decent at it. This is an option. Rocketry: that would be cool. Wife says no. Lockpicking: ohhhhh. Never thought of that! Archery: I do like archery but I feel walking arou

My wife tweeted a post to @zipcarChicago about a recent bill. In a nutshell we were charged for 3,003 miles today for renting the commuter vehicle.  https://twitter.com/queensuchnsuch/status/1056013294492938246?s=21 So being me... I thought “Oh maths!” Let’s see, the Honda CRV AWD has a curb weight of 3,421 lbs, and a 4 cylinder, 184 horsepower motor. When you weigh it, you don't actually get the mass, but the weight, which is the mass multiplied by the acceleration due to gravity, which is 32/feet/second2. If you measure the weight in pounds, divide that number by 32 feet/second2 to get the mass in units called slugs. The CRV is about 107 slugs. Now it's time to do an acceleration test to find how long it takes the car to reach a speed of 60 miles per hour from a standstill. Convert that final speed to feet/second and divide it by the time it took to attain that speed. That gives you the average acceleration. Now you have all you need to find the thrust developed by the en

There really isn’t a reason for me to be angry. I have an excellent life. Today, I just woke up and was pissed off at the world. Could it be the grieving process for having Tobey die? Is it the fact I keep waiting for a shoe to drop and something terrible to happen? Am I waiting for one of my work screw ups to finally catch up to me? I have no idea. Here is what I know. It has been slowly building up. I don’t think it is depression or seasonal affected disorder. I just woke up and was ready to just hurt something. Is this what causes some people to snap? I have a process for working through it. It has happened before. My process is to have a day walking and thinking. On my walk I think “am I alone?” In a city of 3 million people, am I one of those who can’t connect with others emotionally? Why do I feel like I have life all figured out already when I know logically I still have much to learn? How do I take my talents and help people? What will be my legacy? Life is too short t

I rarely remember dreams. Most of the time, I don’t sleep enough to even have a dream. But last night was different. Not only did I dream, but it felt real, it felt like nothing I ever felt before, and I verbally was yelling outside my dream.   It started normal. Talking to my wife, fussing over my kid and waiting for dinner to get ready. As we sat down for dinner, I noticed someone at the back door... but not really there. She had a transparent red, shimmering light cast across her. I stood up, walked to the back door and pulled open the curtain over the window on the door.  She was startled and froze on the stairs. I spoke through the door “can i help you?” She was visibly surprised and i could see that this was not something she expected. Instead of responding, she ran to a car that also had that same shimmering light.  I saw another shimmering woman heading toward the front porch and I ran to the front of my house. As I reached the front window and looked out on the

I am tech savvy. But let me tell you a story about yesterday. I decided to send all of my kids a postcard out of the blue. I walked to the Art Institute of Chicago, picked out 4 fantastic postcards, took them back to my office and wrote clever sayings to each child. I remembered that postcards have a special lower stamp cost so I went to the post office, purchased said postage and carefully removed the stickers from the well bonded backings and placed them on the postcards. Very proud of myself, I dropped them into the stamped letter container and departed from the post office. That night I bragged to my lovely wife about my accomplishment. I explained the process involved and shared all of the glorifying details. She asked me "you had the kids addresses?" #forgotTheAddresses #forgotHowToUseSnailMail #youreWelcomeDeadLetter

Today, the woman I love turns forty. I have had the honor to spend 21 of those years as part of her life. If you have someone you love in your life who you trust implicitly, then you may be as fortunate as me.   She makes me smile. It may be something as simple as laughing at cat videos, or something as complex as a long story that has that twist at the end that catches me off guard. But she does it...daily. She makes me think left and comes from the right. Her sense of humor makes me wonder WHY she stuck with me all these years. Andi can cause it by laughing at situations, something stupid I did like not putting addresses on hand selected postcards with the proper postage mailed at the post office, or laughing at herself for some situation she placed herself in. I am smiling just thinking about her.  Andi make me think. Sometimes it may not be a topic I want to think about right then, but I will mull it over and mentally floss my brain until I think I have a response. She i

I feel that fatherhood is one of the careers that is overlooked in business and dismissed in families.   How does fatherhood help me in my career? Well, it all started with my oldest child’s birth. As a 21 year old Air Force airman, my entire life changed when Jami was being born. It was a sudden realization that I was not only responsible for my wife, but now I am responsible for someone who could not fend for themselves. In an instant, I knew I was going to be something I wasn’t. I had to make sure we had the funds to support our burgeoning family and be there when she fell off the monkey bars, scraped her face along the pavement after riding and falling from her skateboard. I had to have the empathy to try to understand her challenges with life, and her discovery of her own identity.  I am not the best father. I learn more and more what a father should be. I have made and continue to make mistakes.  My adopted father committed suicide when I was six and left me and my moth

Ever want to order two vodkas for that flight to Vegas? I did it. It makes the trip a whole new flight. To set the scene, i am heading to another SharePoint conference in Las Vegas. It has been a while since the last one because Microsoft decided to combine a bunch of conferences and make Ignite. Unfortunately, the SharePoint folks weren’t getting as much out of the conference than they did when it was SharePoint conference by itself.   But I digress, during this 4 hour flight to Las Vegas, I decided that a couple travel vodkas and orange juice was in order. The in-flight entertainment is boring and I wanted a drink. Tito’s is not my favorite, but the corn vodka is better than so many of the grain vodkas.  I picked the seat for my flight long ago when I booked. The seats near me were empty and I thought I was going to have a bit of room. I chose the aisle seat because I wanted the arm room. But when we boarded the plane I was pleasantly greeted with the back half of the plan