what a month

It has been quite a month, friends.

Looking for Work

On Monday April 21st, I was informed that I would be leaving NISO. There was no warning, and the reason given was a general economic downturn and the waves hands around chaos of modern non-profit life, primarily from government agencies. I had just days to try and responsibly transfer five years of work to my coworkers, and I hope I did a reasonable job of it. Things that I created are continuing (NISO Plus) and projects that I was deeply embedded in (SeamlessAccess, internal NISO tech changes and updates) are moving on with new/different leadership.

I am already deep into job search work, and have interviewed for a few great positions, but if you know of anything coming up (including project based/short term technology consulting) please touch base and let me know. Complications are: remote work necessary for at least the next 12-18 months until we get Eliza out to college, and I’m at a stage where I’m looking for Director/VP/C-level work (depending on the size of the organization). Open to any sort of organization, but have the most experience with libraries, non-profits, and corporations in the information/publishing space.

My CV and resume are both available here, and you can reach me at jason@griffey.name for any sort of job inquiry.

Hits Keep Coming

A week or so after wrapping things up at NISO, I woke up feeling very off, with a familiar pain in my lower back. As the morning went on, it became apparent to me that what I was noticing was likely a kidney stone. I had one back in 2014, I knew that recurrence was possible…but going over a decade without one, I thought maybe I’d gotten lucky. Turns out I hadn’t, and after a trip to the ER and some really good pain meds and an MRI, I was diagnosed with a roughly 3mm stone that I had to just wait to pass.

After a rough day the following day, it did finally pass, and I assumed I’d dodged days of pain.

Body Blows Continue

And then came the follow up with a urologist to make sure there wasn’t any damage or more stones waiting to wreak havoc. Turns out, all looks ok there…but there was this issue of a pesky something on the top of my kidney. After some contrast imaging, it appears I have a roughly 3cm mass just at the top of my right kidney. Doesn’t look like it’s dangerous, doesn’t appear to be metastatic, doesn’t look like there’s any sign of anything anywhere else. But it does need to be removed, so I’m currently waiting on follow up with a specialist in robotic surgery to schedule the removal of the mass.

The urologist assures me that it isn’t an emergency, that this is an imminently removable mass, and with robotic laparoscopy the chance of complications is very low. Surgery itself is fairly quick, just scooping off the very top of my right kidney, and maybe 2-3 days in hospital for recovery. 1-2 weeks of rest at home, and I should be good to go after that. Best case scenario this means 10 days or so “out of commission”, worst case would be a couple of weeks. I’m hoping to be able to wait until after the summer, but I won’t really know for another week or so until the surgical consultation.

It Has Been A Month

All of that, in the last 4 weeks. Was downsized, spent a couple of days in awful pain, and now I’m sorting out scheduling my first ever major surgery. I wanted to get all of this news out into the world not for sympathy, but just to say that if I haven’t gotten back to you about something, it’s because there’s Been Some Stuff.

Still, I’m overall in much better shape than I could be. We’re still ok as a family, I do have some time to find new work, we still have health insurance through Betsy’s workplace, and I can pick up consulting work in the meantime to bridge any financial gaps. My health crises are manageable, solvable, and not emergencies. So I’m lucky…but there were a few days this month where it really didn’t feel like it.