Tuesday, July 12, 2011

The Dilema


The big news on my list is that I'm two and a half weeks from being married. The bigger news is that I've contemplated the move back to Western New York for our new family sometime within the next six months.

Will it happen? I don't know.

The winter would be a rather harsh transition to my roots, but I would love to jump back into my gear and take to the ice on a team again. Hitting the slopes would be pretty cool, too. I miss winter sports, but I'll need more than skates and skis to make the move a lock.

I have a pretty solid career in marketing with a nice little background in journalism. The two of them make for a pretty sweet combo. How will that translate to the mainland job market? That's the million-dollar question.

The sound of media would lure me home in a heartbeat. Print media is dying but I still love it. I'm a bigger fan of digital media, with a passion for broadcast media in all its forms. I could see myself on the news or rocking a talk radio show, but I'd have to pay my dues first.

The kicker is that I had those jobs offered to me in Guam and I was about three weeks late on an offer for ESPN 550 in Hawaii. That would have been huge, but at least I got to spend three hours on the air with the guy who runs the station and the guy who strolled in off the streets to fill the opening they had.

That was pretty cool.

I liked the Maui position better than what was on the table in Guam for a couple of reasons. As a matter of location and station, I'd take Mauui and ESPN radio over Guam any day. Aside from the prestige, Maui just seems more livable than Guam.

Guam isn't all bad, and there might be a day when I think about the old offer. Realistically, that door has probably closed behind me, but I think there might be a toe or two stuck in there that could provide me with a shot, should we decide to swap paradise for a larger rock with deeper issues and traffic.

Maybe a move to Guam would be the first transition to the mainland. At the very least, the change of pace would be more akin to life back home. Sadly, the beaches in Guam are no match for what I've been spoiled with the past eight and a half years in the CNMI.

And then you've got the people. There are a couple of people whom I absolutely love in Guam, but the rest seem to be a little more uptight than the folks in Saipan. Don't get me wrong, we've got our special cases here, but the people as a whole are a bit more hospitable than your regular Jose in Guam.

History and a lot of hopped-up military guys have a lot to do with that. I'm not at all a fan of living in a town that's near a military base, much less two. To make it worse, Guam is loaded full of squids and fly boys with a bunch of jar heads on the way.

The pogues are bad enough, but the brainless leathernecks + alcohol = a boat load of trouble for the reputation of mainlanders. That serves as my Exhibit A when it comes to my case against a military presence in the Northern Marianas, but that's another story altogether.

Sunday, May 15, 2011

Missing You, B-Lo

It's going to be a while before I make it back to the 716 and that makes me miss Western New York that much more. Above all else, I miss spending time with my family back home. During my two weeks in Buffalo last summer I realized how much I've missed out as the uncle of a great kid.

A trip back home would provide some much needed buddy time with my nephew, Cade. The two of us got to hit the ice together, head out to the movies, catch a Bisons game, stroll down to Antoinette's for some ice cream, and much more.

Basically, for the first time in my life I got to be Uncle Brad. That was pretty cool