A Definite Direction

My journey toward rediscovery of my career path has taken on a life of its own.

I feel like I've come such a long way since the last post.

Long term direction
I've decided to learn about new applications of what I know. This means: choosing a whole new industry in which to apply my expertise.

The industry I've chosen is.... drumroll please...

Healthcare IT.

This choice stems from my fascination with the medical profession and its potential to improve the quality of life for just about everyone. I am both a direct consumer of medical services and a passive observer of how information flows from patients to the "medical establishment" and back to patients.

It became immediately obvious that in order to apply what I know about computers and applications to the field of healthcare, it was going to require some high quality formal training.

So I enrolled in the AMIA's 10x10 program through Nova Southeastern University.
So far, so good. It began on March 30, 2009, and should be finishing up early June.
The recorded lectures are extremely well delivered, and the reading material is very interesting, not to mention voluminous. I look forward to meeting the other students in the group.

Keeping current in my area of specialization
So while I've picked a Totally Different industry to focus on than what I've done in the past (working for a hardware manufacturer) -- I've got to keep up with the latest and greatest in my software development world, and dive headfirst into the new developments that have come along since I blinked last.

Here are the highlights:

• Joined the Space Coast .NET Users group and went to a presentation on Microsoft Silverlight by Tim Heuer.
  
• Went to the 2009 Orlando .NET Code Camp at Seminole Community College. What a fantastic and productive day.
  
• Joined the Space Coast SQL Users Group. I'm looking forward to their next monthly meeting. I've met organizers Bonnie and Lynn at the Orlando CodeCamp and appreciated their enthusiastic and warm welcome.

I've also installed Microsoft's new Web Platform Installer which is a handy way to install the Visual Web Developer 2008 Express edition and all the other paraphernalia such as IIS, ASP.NET 3.5, and other handy tools. I'll be putting these to good use in my spare time, since I've recently migrated one of my nonprofit's sites from a Linux Apache host to a Windows based host.

And last but not least, I've gotten in some quality time to take walks with my husband, go bike riding, and play a rollicking good game of "Taboo" with my daughter and her friend.

Life is good.