Where have I been?

I've been working in retail, at one of the most valued companies in America and around the world. Getting my mojo back as it were, as a technology enthusiast and as a marketer working on consumer expectations one client at a time. As you'd expect my legacy of working and using communications and information technology, the stories about how I had integrated the brand into my personal life (that sounds really marketeer-ish but was a couple of stories about how my 3-year old daughter and I had convinced my wife that we'd purchased a box of fruit for her for Christmas, when in fact it was an Apple computer, and how I had replaced my hard drive and learned the hard way about the need for the GUID file format), helped me secure an extraordinary position at the firm.

I am grateful to be working. I am grateful to be working for a company that makes such great products. I am grateful to have the opportunity to help customers every day get more out of their technologies than they otherwise might have. I don't know if I'll be doing this a month from now, a year from now or a decade from now. But I do know that I enjoy the discipline, the pace and the way the management team and my coworkers help me be the best I can be.

I went to bed one Wednesday night in September 2011 and as a final note of frustration before my eyelids really sagged that evening, I did a search on Monster.com (the jobs board) on my iPad. The search was "iOS developer."

Wow!

The results floored me. There were half a dozen gigs in Boston alone, and they were all fresh opportunities too. I went to sleep committed to revisit this result and to take positive action on career. Waiting for a shoe to drop just seemed a little unproductive.

On the otherhand, the software engineering scope of mobile device software development really got my imagination boiling and I was hooked. The next day, I rewrote my resume to include my apps and what they did, my education without the year of graduation and my contact details. One page. That's all. Nice.

By the time Friday rolled around, I had two telephone interviews scheduled for the Friday and another on Monday. It was outstanding interest in my iOS development skills.

But, then the recruiters started asking questions:

• Where did you learn your iOS skills?
• Are these apps for a firm?
• What did you do before you started coding?
• What was your pay in your last assignment?

Many of these questions seem so logical now, but at the time they seemed a little hard to appreciate what the recruiter was after.

Then I applied at apple.com/careers and checked out technical roles in Retail in central MA. Eureka! The store nearest our home was hiring a 'Genius.'

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In concert with the time for self-improvement career-wise, I took the steps and effort to improve my body.

As my business was growing in early 2008, I took it upon myself to walk to our local gym and ride their stationary bicycles while watching TV. This was I combined the practice of news-entertainment and self-information with the monotony of riding. I'm not sure if I lot a lot of weight this way, but I sure did build up my stamina for exercise.

After a year and just as the recession began, I looked for extra costs to eliminate and the gym membership was one of those casualties. Instead, I decided to use the stationary bike I already owned. Although not as sophisticated as those in the gym, it was plenty robust and functional, especially when placed in front of the TV.

Nevertheless, I found that after an hour of TV watching while cycling, I was hardly sweating so I decided to run up and down the stairs before riding. Counting the cycles up using a counter on my iPhone made my exercise consistent and certainly sweaty. After 20 and then 30 cycles, I would ride the bike for 45 minutes watching the news.

This worked great during the New England dark times (December through March) where it's just too cold and too icy to go out running. As spring approached, the stairs-bike combination was getting dull, my son suggested I should run for a short distance (1.3 miles) around our neighborhood. I did. It felt great. After a few months, I simply changed my route until today, where I'm running either 4 miles if I'm in a hurry, or 5.3 miles if I have the time and feel the urge to go a little farther.

Through diet (no carbohydrates like pasta, bread, potatoes) control and this excellent exercise regime, I've lost 40 pounds in a year and feel great. So at the very least, I've made a great personal improvement as a result of this terrible recession.