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That Restless Feeling When You’re Waiting to Travel

This time next week I’ll be traveling to Las Vegas for three security conferences, and I’m finding myself in a restless state of mind. It’s that point where the planning and logistics have been worked out, and I’m itching to just get on with the mission at hand.

It’s a mindset that conflicts with the “one day at a time” system of living I’ve worked hard to adopt in recent years.

Mood music:

http://youtu.be/Skq1llOdeQs

I do “one day at a time” a lot better than I used to. But as a human being, I’m occasionally going to slip and become unanchored. I know a lot of people who get this way right before an important business trip.

In my case it’s not a fear thing; I’m looking forward to it. The challenge is in remembering where I am and what I’m supposed to be doing until travel day arrives.

True, as conferences go in my industry, this Vegas trilogy is big. There are a lot of people to reach and a lot of writing and networking to be done. A lot of energy goes into doing it well. For now, that energy is bottled up, waiting for the appointed time. That ratchets up the feeling of restlessness.

But there’s a lot of life going on between now and when I fly — things I also look forward to.

It’s up to me to keep the restless energy in its proper place and focus on the here and now.

I’ll let y’all know how that goes.

tornado funnel

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Black Hat, BSidesLV, DEF CON Anxiety Leads to Stress Dreams

I typically don’t remember my dreams, but Tuesday night I had a doozy of a stress dream. You could say my brain was smacking me for making light of other people’s anxieties in the run up to Black Hat, DEF CON and BSidesLV.

Every year at this time I start to hear people worrying aloud about their Vegas schedules, which is understandable. I used to create detailed schedules but threw out the script a few years ago when my fear of the unexpected diminished.

But Tuesday night’s dream proves that I still get as anxious as other people on occasion.

Mood music:

In the dream, I wake up in the middle of a food court in Vegas. I’m apparently in Vegas for just a day, and I realize I’ve slept through most of the one day I was scheduled to be there. It’s 7:28 p.m., and I realize I’ve missed all of that day’s conference proceedings. To make matters worse, I have to pack my things and change hotels before I can salvage any networking I can squeeze out of the trip. I walk two miles in the desert with all my luggage to the next taxi line. Somewhere in there, I check my voicemail and find a message from my father asking me to call him.

Then I wake up, relieved and pissed off at the same time.

There’s something about RSA and Black Hat/BSidesLV/DEF CON that bring this out of me in the two weeks leading up to showtime. They are indeed monster events for our industry — places to be seen, contribute content, pitch your company’s message and catch up with friends and far-flung colleagues. To miss it seems like a fail to a lot of people think as the moment closes in. It’s an irrational fear, but it’s there nonetheless.

I’m framing this by the industry I work in, but this anxiety isn’t strictly a security community issue. It’s something people in all walks of life deal with.

Such anxiety used to be much worse. I used to panic months in advance about the flights and whether the planes would stay in the air. I’d worry about how many stories I had to write to be considered successful at the event.

Now, it seems, my issue has narrowed to the obsession with simply getting from points A to B.

It’s progress, but I can’t help feeling stupid when I succumb to a pressure no one instigated but me.

sign: welcome to fabulous las vegas nevada

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You’re a Good Man, Trey Ford

As most of my friends in the information security community know, one of our own — Trey Ford — got left out in the cold last week when Black Hat’s powers that be decided they no longer needed a general manager to handle their annual summer conference. He’s following the proven path of seeking new job leads on the social networks.

But he’s doing something else that makes him worthy of mention here.

Mood music:

http://youtu.be/-BTad4tTdrE

Most people would single-mindedly push forward on their own job hunt, and that’s not a criticism. When you have bills to pay and mouths to feed, you have to do what’s necessary to get re-employed as quickly as possible.

But knowing that a lot of other people in the industry are looking for new jobs, Trey is offering to use his vast network to help them as he tries to help himself. In a message on Facebook, he said:

There are a number of folks looking for work, and I have fresh perspective on opportunities out there. Drop me an email and I will do what I can to help assist you in your hunt.

During times of global trauma, I like to refer people to a post I wrote two years ago about words of wisdom from Mister Rogers’s mother. She’d say that in tough times, the helpers always arrive.

While it’s certainly true during huge tragedies like the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School last year and the Boston Marathon bombings this year, it also applies to the seemingly smaller events, like someone losing a job and needing help to find a new one. In such cases, the hardship involves individuals rather than big segments of the population, but if you’re the individual who has lost income, it’s a pretty grave deal.

It warms the heart to know that there are people out there hell-bent on helping those individuals.

That someone like Trey would offer help when he needs to find work himself is damn inspiring.

Thanks for being you and Merry Christmas, friend.

Trey Ford