023: Wake up!... Don't sleep on him

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
But yeah, so I ended up, you know, got out
the military. I was job searching when it did a
couple of interviews, and I'm thinking, I'm like, you know,
I know my stuff. You know, this is my first
time doing a civilian interview though, because I've been to the
military since I was eighteen and then now I was
what twenty seven, So I'm thinking, I'm like, this is

(00:22):
my first like big boy interview, kind of adult interview
with the civilian company. So, you know, I did it.
Things was good. I kind of like, you know, stumbled
a little bit through it. But as far as the
technical side of it, I kind of I got the
technical aspect behind it. It was more so the behavioral thing,
like asking me, you know, well, what would you do
in these kinds of situations, because at the time in

(00:43):
the military, you know, you kind of you know what
you're supposed to be doing, So it's not really a
like a, oh, what happens if this happens. It's like, no,
I know what's what I'm supposed to do. I know
what to do when when that happens, Like I'm already
prepared for that, and if it's something that I'm not
prepared for, then it's for somebody else. Yeah, yeah, exactly,
you have a team. So I had to understand that

(01:06):
aspect and had to grasp how to pretty much relay
the behavior with the experience that I already had from
the military, and how to translate that into what they
were looking for into the world. So I think it
probably before I got out. I got out. January twenty
eighth of twenty twenty one was my last day in
the military, and I had got my I signed a contract, well,

(01:29):
I signed my offer letter with our old employer. Actually,
and Rico was on my interview for the job. Actually,
and the day prior to that interview, I know, right,
the day prior to that, I had just interviewed with
them with another company and they had actually given me
an offer letter. After the company that I interviewed with you,

(01:49):
that you was working at, that we were both working at,
they offered me. And I was like, man, you know what,
it was, honestly the interview with you that actually made
me want to work at that company because I can't
take no loss. I don't even know what they cost.

Speaker 2 (02:04):
I hit the ground in and go off, yah, hit
the ground then to go off yah.

Speaker 1 (02:07):
I can't take no loss.

Speaker 3 (02:08):
Yeah, I don't even know what they cost.

Speaker 1 (02:10):
I hit the ground in and go well yeah. Stephen
Jones from Brooklyn, New York, grew up in Newport News, Virginia.
Pretty much, uh, I guess starting off of when I
got into tech leading up into there, I've been interested
in technology since I was a little kid. Honestly, probably
started when I was maybe like five. Me and my

(02:32):
brother we used to just take apart like walkie talkie.
My mom should get pissed off because all of our
toys were just taking apart. But at that point I
was like, you know, tech was pretty much it for me.

Speaker 4 (02:42):
So they all asked, what was y'all just taking them
apart and leaving them broke?

Speaker 1 (02:46):
Was like, yeah, you know, to see, that's the thing
about it, Like, you know, we didn't really know what
we were doing taking them apart, so we took them apart.
We were really breaking them. You know, the screws weren't
getting unscrewed right, so there really was no putting them
back together at that.

Speaker 4 (02:59):
But in your mind you were thinking, like, man, if
I can take this and put this, I can probably
make a robot. I went through the same stuffing my
mind cause a part trying to like figure out how
to do it.

Speaker 1 (03:09):
But you know, yeah, exactly in my mind, I was
a scientist, I'm be honest with you. But but yeah,
so then, uh, leading up into like middle school high school,
we didn't really have any like computer tech like classes
or whatever. And in the schools that I I went,
I went to. Most of the classes that I did
were like, uh, like mechanical so mechanical engineering, yeah, shop

(03:31):
and stuff like that. So when I got into high school,
I got into this one class and it was like
it was pretty much like like tech, but it was
more so the mechanical side doing AutoCAD, like the drawings
on the computer and things like that. So I got
my AutoCAD license when I was in high school, and
I thought that's what I wanted to do. But I
was supposed to I was going to go to college. Actually,

(03:51):
I was going to go to Citadel. And then this
is before I decided to even join the military, which
really like is when my tech career kind of you know,
everything took off just on the military. But yeah, leaving
high school, I decided not to go to college anymore
because it was extremely expensive to go to Citadel. They
were talking like forty five thousand a year. Well, yeah,
extremely expensive. So I was like, man, you know that's

(04:13):
that's just not feasible. So I was like, well, if
I go to the Citadel anyways, I was gonna end
up in the military regardless up going into Yeah, I
ended up going into the Navy, And yeah, Navy wasn't
my first choice. I actually I kind of dodged the ship.
I'm not gonna lie to you. I won't I won't lie.
I spent a lot of time, like my first unit

(04:35):
in the Navy when I joined straight out of high school,
cut the whole college thing out of the cut that
out of the equation, went to the Navy, went into
the Navy as an IT. So my cousin, he was
a E seven in the Navy at the time, my
chief and he was it, and he was telling me,
he was like, hey, man, that's the job you want
to do because you know, that's like, that's where the
technology is going to be. You know, that's a good

(04:56):
job when you get out the military. And I'm just like,
you know, I was just thinking myself, Hey, I finally
get to do some tech stuff. And I was already
gonna go to the military anyways after college. So I
mean I feel like I was fast tracking where I
was already headed anywhere in the first place.

Speaker 4 (05:10):
So so you so you're trying to say you when
you even when you was like in high school gett
going to the military, you already knew way before we
were thought of.

Speaker 5 (05:18):
You already knew you was one to do. Folks.

Speaker 1 (05:23):
I just grew up. It's just like in my blood,
you know, that was it. But yeah, straight for real,
I need one for real. But uh but yeah, so yeah,
joined the Navy, went through boot camp, the whole nine,
you know, got to my first unit with like first
Actually I was fast forward backtrack. So in tech school,
you know, after you get out of boot camp, you

(05:43):
go to a tech school. I know in the Army
they call it a I T and like other branches
they call other things. But yeah, so for us, I
was in my tech school and I was like, man,
I really don't know much about it, and this is
pretty much my first time getting exposed to it. So
they had just started a new pilot program for US,
and they'd be like, yo, this is the new it

(06:05):
a school and I was like, Okay, I thought that's
what it was in the first place. When I first
signed up for it, Yes, I was like, okay, cool,
Like that's what I thought I was going to do
in the first place, talking about like these buildings look horrible,
but all right. But so, the one thing about it

(06:27):
was they were like, hey, yeah, you know our I
the students now in your class, the pilot class. You guys,
when you graduate the school, you all are going to
graduate with certifications. So I was like, oh, okay, that
sounds pretty cool because you know, I had already got
the Autocast shirt when I was in high school. So
I'm thinking, I'm like, yeah, I got that Autocat shirt,
so I know that's going to help me with get
knee shirts because I had no clue.

Speaker 5 (06:48):
T shirt.

Speaker 1 (06:49):
Man, let me be honest with you. I was in
school making RUBERC cubes on the computer. Oh man, man,
I'm telling you, man.

Speaker 6 (07:01):
It don't feel bad. I did all okay when I
was in school. Man, they reeled everybody in with that.

Speaker 4 (07:07):
I feel like you had that class, yeah right there
telling But yeah, so so you did a I T
And what what kind of certifications did y'all get? YEA
the Air Force Girls telling us they were getting down there, everything.

Speaker 5 (07:23):
Up and there.

Speaker 1 (07:24):
Yeah. Yeah, so at the time they were giving us
A plus and then we would get Security plus and
then we would get also. At the time, I want
to say it was Microsoft. It was like Microsoft Plus
or something like my m CP or something like that,
I believe, but it was like the oldest TP. Yeah,
it was that weird ac. It was back in the

(07:44):
twenty I was in what twenty twelve.

Speaker 7 (07:50):
Yeah, it was probably MC m C A, m C
A cow many how many tests?

Speaker 1 (07:55):
It was two tests? It was like seven. It was
a seven hundred serious test and I remember it was
two of them we to take.

Speaker 6 (08:01):
Yeah, I might have just been m C P. I
think the m C I T was like five or
seven tests depending.

Speaker 8 (08:09):
J k L.

Speaker 1 (08:13):
Just keep adding letters every year back in those days.

Speaker 7 (08:16):
Microsoft was doing.

Speaker 1 (08:17):
This exactly exactly. But you know you're gonna get all
of these shirts when you get out of here. You
know it's gonna make you marketable and you're gonna be
super smart when you hit the you know, hit the fleet. Yeah.
They hyping us. I'm like, all right, cool. What they
didn't tell us is that, all right. Granted y'all may
not know anything about technology. But if you don't pass

(08:38):
these shirts, then you go into the fleet and designated
and you're losing your job. So I was like, yes, man, swallow,
I'm telling you. I was like, man, and they're telling
us just the day of the exams. So we had
already did like about I think probably like eight weeks.
So I'm coming up on my man. Come on, you

(09:00):
know eight plus is two parts. So I'm like, all right,
I'm doing the troubleshooting part. I get to the test.
I was like, man, that was hard. I get to
the because you know the printer. The printer, they'll print
out your test score. So I walk up there to
get the test score. My teacher grabbed it off the
joint and it was folded like that when he handed
it to me. When he handed to me, I said, man.

(09:20):
When he handed to me, I looked over. I said
this failed. I said, so, yes, it said failed. So
I was like, man, what's gonna happen. I'm thinking I'm
about to get kicked out of the school. They were
like nah, man. They was like, no, you get you
get three chances to pass it. And I was like, oh, okay, cool.
I was like, yeah, I get it the next time.
I'm not really tripping on that next time, so so
you fail. So yeah, so I felt and then you know,

(09:43):
it was it was one of them things where I
was kind of shipped. I was I was shook because
I'm thinking I'm about to get kicked out. So they
told us, now we get you get three chances. So
I'm like, all right, cool, you know I'm gonna definitely
be able to get this the next time. I'm studying.
And ironically my roommate failed too, and I mean exactly,
So we're both studying, we're staying up, we're doing flash
cards and everything. Boom we go. Two weeks later, we

(10:05):
go to take the test. He comes out of there
smiling like, yeah, bro, I got it. Another fold of paper,
I said, dang, I said, all right, man. Third time
for the charm, I was like yo, I like if
this don't happen, then I mean, hey, I'm out of this.
I'm done. And we didn't get two weeks to study
this like the third time. They gave us two days.

(10:26):
So they was like yeah, coffee.

Speaker 8 (10:30):
So was this the first or the second part? You
was taken for the A plus.

Speaker 1 (10:34):
This was the first part. First part. Yeah, the first test,
I'm telling you, man, I'm telling it was rough for
me at first, because, mind you, I loved the I
I love technology, but I didn't know what it really
took to learn it. That's what it was. So when
I come to the third test, you know, right before
I was supposed to take the test, I called my mom.
I'm like, Mom, I'm about to take this cert. If

(10:55):
I don't pass, then I'm gonna lose my job. So
I mean, I'm still being the Navy. And she was like, oh,
don't worry about it. You know you're smart this and that.
I was like, all right, I go in there.

Speaker 7 (11:04):
Man.

Speaker 1 (11:04):
I took the test, got the highest score in the class,
like out of all the click out of all the kids.
Mind you, I didn't really take too much pride into
it because it took me three times. So it's like exactly,
They're like, man, you better, I scored the highest You've
seen all the questions at this point, and I was like,
all right, thanks, I appreciate it. But but yeah, so
that was a that was a plus. That was the
first one. Second test came, so I was already kind

(11:27):
of ready for the for the second test from after
you know, struggling with the first one. So I actually
passed the second test on the first try.

Speaker 4 (11:33):
I was like, you know, smooth, too easy, people sleep
on a plus, they really did tell you that thing
is hard to tell, say the pinouts, and and you learn,
like you learned some pretty good stuff in there too, actually,
like the little basis that they go into.

Speaker 5 (11:52):
At the time, at.

Speaker 4 (11:53):
Least it was like stuff that you needed to know
to pass the VCaP. Oh, yeah, you know what I mean.
They're learning about like the the memory stuff that's in there,
really stuff.

Speaker 5 (12:03):
Yeah, so you.

Speaker 4 (12:06):
And you were using the navy as an I he said,
you never got the ship right.

Speaker 1 (12:11):
No, So, I mean I've been on the ship before,
but it wasn't really like a Navy ship. Yeah. I
spent time just like uh, just like just out and
about pretty much doing some like nonsense with the with
them guys or whatever, you know, having fun with them.
How though it was probably about like.

Speaker 5 (12:27):
You wouldn't like slipping on it and that.

Speaker 1 (12:29):
No, we weren't sleeping on We were just like out
and about kind of just basically loading up equipment, installing
new network equipment, then taking off the team that I was.
It was like one of them Tiger teams, you know,
come out there and stuff and just exactly.

Speaker 5 (12:40):
So that's why count in Texas. And then you're saying
you was in text. Eve been in the text.

Speaker 1 (12:46):
Exactly exactly, so that's why I'm like, nah, I never
really did the ship like everybody else did, but most
of my time in the Navy. When I first got
to my first unit, so fast forward past a school
I ended up did I passed all the CERTs, you know,
got them, got out of a school, got to my
first unit. It was a cyber defense operation command. So
when I first got there, I was like, all right,

(13:07):
you know, I just learned all this A Plus stuff
in tech school. I learned Microsoft stuff. And then I
get to my first unit and they're like, nah, you're
going to be doing network scans and things like I'm like, okay, well,
I ain't learned about this in tech school. I was like,
it's different. But that was the security side to it
that you know, they hinted to it in Security Plus,

(13:28):
but we didn't really do any like actual network scanning,
any type like blue team type things like actions. So
it spent a lot of time learning that, learning the
different vulnerabilities and then the command I was at, we
actually we would request the other fleet and other commands
their scans. They would send them in US and then
we would validate them, you know, see what they were

(13:49):
complying on the whatever case may be. So it was
good experience as far as that goes. But right after that,
I got put right into that like as soon as
I got to as soon as soon as I got
to that unit. Now I don't know what happened, but
we got a new we got a new CEO. They decided,
you know, do the re org, you know how military is,
and I was no longer doing network skins. Now I

(14:11):
found myself in help desk and I was like, man,
this is a little step back in it a little
bit so, but I felt like it was a good
a good learning curve also too, because the help desk
it kind of gave me that like customer face to
face type of like training because a lot of time
when you're in it depend on what kind of role

(14:31):
you're in. You're not really interfacing what customers that often
unless you're in like a help desk role. It's just
like when you're like a Tier three engineer, you're kind
of just talking to whoever the lead is at that point.
So that was good there. So that was my first
unit and I was there for about four years. Transferred
out of there, went to Tampa. Whar I'm at now,

(14:52):
and I was on mcdeal at u JCSSE and it
was a joint and that was where I did like
a lot of the expeditionary comms. I got rid into,
like the networking routing, switching the servers, configuring servers. And
that's when I kind of like really got deep, deep,
deep technically because I spent a lot of time pretty
much configuring things from.

Speaker 4 (15:10):
Scratch yuse you got you got those kids there you see, Yeah,
of network going on and there, Yeah, absolutely did you. Also,
is that also where you learn virtualization?

Speaker 1 (15:21):
Yeah, that's actually where I was introduced to Like my my,
my one love is virtualization. That love, that's my one love. Man, virtualization.

Speaker 5 (15:28):
Man, it is gonna bring you in.

Speaker 1 (15:31):
I know, right, tell me about it. But yeah, I got.

Speaker 5 (15:35):
By like getting introduced virtualization. What was that like?

Speaker 4 (15:37):
You know, after all, it's time doing networking. What what
was it like? Because that's that's some some people they
don't get over like their network and they don't deal
with systems, and some system people that don't deal with
network they don't understand eiders and all the other stuff.

Speaker 1 (15:54):
Yeah, yeah, no, absolutely, it was definitely. I felt like
it was a lot different because the simple fact that
when it comes to virtualization, a lot of it is
you do have the UI, so it is a lot
more interaction, a lot more interface, so it is a
little bit more user friendly for people. Some people don't
like really punching in commands and configuring routers and you know,
the networking portion of it just pretty much staring at

(16:14):
numbers a lot. But with the virtualization, you're kind of
you're more so monitoring your systems, your applications that are running.
You're setting up virtual infrastructure. That's like it's really abstracted
away from what you can see and touch. So I
think that's the part that kind of like drew me
in for it, because it's like I'm running a computer
within a computer. I was like, oh man, that's cool,

(16:35):
and then like, you know, you can do different things
that that nature manipulate the computers to do what you
need to do. So that part right there is really
would like drew me into virtualization.

Speaker 5 (16:44):
So I imagine that either all the time.

Speaker 4 (16:46):
So you had these Microsoft service some Contia stuff also
coming out of schoolhouse and you get you know, dropped
in you know, net doing network skin I think you
said we're right now. It might have been around yet,
and then getting pushed in the network. That's that's Kenny's avenue.
M Did you end up getting network certifications and then yeah,

(17:08):
you end up getting introduced to virtualization. Did you pursue
certification in there for and for whatever reason that you
do that?

Speaker 7 (17:15):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (17:16):
Yeah, So when I got introduced the networking, I was
actually fell in love with the I'm not gonna lie
so because I mean again, I was just really into technology,
and once I started learning it, that's when I really
started enjoying it.

Speaker 4 (17:27):
I feel like, you're so, you mean, tell me you
actually love networking, cheated on networking with virtualization, And.

Speaker 1 (17:42):
I will say that it's like I kind of bounced
around a lot. I really did bounce around a lot.
You know, it's sad street street.

Speaker 8 (17:59):
Street.

Speaker 7 (18:00):
Hey Hey, hey girl, hey hey girl. What you're doing?
You virtualized you in the cloud? What's going on?

Speaker 4 (18:05):
Girl?

Speaker 7 (18:06):
Come on over here, show me what's up.

Speaker 5 (18:08):
Yeah?

Speaker 7 (18:09):
I like that.

Speaker 6 (18:10):
I like that cloud. I like that virtualization ship should
be doing girl.

Speaker 5 (18:17):
And it even funny, bro, because that dude see damage. Man,
he dammage. Yeah, Man, you talk, you gotta go do
it alone. Brother, all right, all right, get back to it, bro.

Speaker 1 (18:34):
So many man, were the streets?

Speaker 7 (18:48):
Were the streets? Yeah?

Speaker 8 (18:54):
All right?

Speaker 6 (18:55):
Another one another way?

Speaker 8 (19:02):
Certification?

Speaker 5 (19:03):
Brother, what you go?

Speaker 8 (19:03):
Man?

Speaker 1 (19:05):
So yeah, so yeah, like certifications. When I got to networking,
pretty much the thing for networking went back then. When
I was into it, it was probably around like twenty
fifteen twenty sixteen is when I was like on my
networking kick. A lot of people were getting the CompTIA
Network Plus and then some people were getting CCNA, so

(19:25):
I went to CCNA Route. I got the CCNA route
and switch, and then I got my CCNA security during
that time frame when I was pretty much on the
networking kick. But again, once I got introduced to virtualization,
it kind of just I mean, I'll touched the networking
here and there when I need to, but you know,
I really try to stay to the server virtualization side.

(19:45):
I just like that more. And once I switched over
to the server virtualization side, I was like, man, you
know what I got networking SERTs. I mean, how would
I look to not have no virtualization shirts when I'm
a virtualization guy now? So I went, I got my
VCP Envy, and then I got my VCP the Data
Center Virtualization one too.

Speaker 5 (20:05):
Okay, I know Michael got some stuff to say maybe.

Speaker 2 (20:08):
Yeah, I got something to say about this, and I'm
gonna be on my Kevin same as ship you modern
the I T folks always bounced around.

Speaker 5 (20:16):
So much you just don't know how to be go ahead, man.

Speaker 1 (20:22):
I was just for real, man, I'm telling it is rough,
you know, to bounce around like that, But.

Speaker 5 (20:28):
Is it really enough?

Speaker 1 (20:29):
No, it's not. But I felt like it was good experience,
you know. I was like I was, I was just
really trying to learn everything for honest. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (20:36):
Yeah, it pros becomes everything, brother, absolutely everything, absolutely absolutely
So did.

Speaker 2 (20:42):
That benefit you going into other roles like knowing how
to about how to move around in the IT space
with the network and the virtualization, the poptic stories.

Speaker 5 (20:52):
I don't know if you touched.

Speaker 7 (20:52):
On that at all.

Speaker 1 (20:54):
Yeah, yeah, absolutely So when I got my virtualization side
of things, I started touching the the v saying, you
know your newtanics, the different virtualized storage solutions. I started
doing all of that too, and some virtual networking also,
and basically all my security and networking knowledge prior to
when I got into virtualization. It kind of helped kind

(21:14):
of give me the full circle, the full scope view
of like the entire system. So and it also helped
me with my troubleshooting as well, because I mean, you know,
just because I'm a system guy, I can don't know
when there's an issue with the route. You know that
I don't have to I can tell you that that's
the problem because I know what that looks like versus
you know, maybe somebody who's not into networking or they

(21:34):
don't they don't care for networking. That just passed to
the network engineers. So I was always really willing to
learn and to help just because I know. Troubleshooting is
like your bread and butter, and it for honestly, because
you learn everything through when you break.

Speaker 5 (21:48):
Things, so you build, you build something.

Speaker 4 (21:51):
Once you were troubleshooting the media times exactly exactly.

Speaker 2 (21:56):
That's where school trust people downplay experience, or at least
they don't put enough fucking respect on it. Experience has
a lot of weight to it. I mean Rico talked
about it in the previous episode. He was talking about
trouble shooting stuff in right and how he learned all
this stuff.

Speaker 5 (22:13):
You learn a lot in your trouble shooting.

Speaker 1 (22:17):
Oh yeah, yeah, I mean I've pretty much learned i'd say,
everything that I know through pretty much troubleshooting. I mean yeah,
i'd say up until like the last year of like
my technical journey of things that I've been learning, you know,
keeping up with it really hasn't been so much I'm
learning through like breaking things as much anymore. It's more
so learning kind of like the theory behind a lot

(22:38):
of things too, like the overall architecture of like cloud
applications and containerization and how that fits into everything. So
and that's pretty much just putting all of the background
that I've had already, pretty much putting it all together.

Speaker 4 (22:51):
It sounds like you kind of take the same approach,
I'll tell you with it. So generally, what I like
to do is I like to go in there, get lost,
break some stuff, and then when I figure out kind
of where I'm at and how to fix this thing,
and I go back and read a little bit deeper
about it, understand how how it, you know, touches the
other things I know about. And then when you find
out some other stuff and you find okay, well this

(23:13):
thing is related to this, and it's connected to that.

Speaker 5 (23:16):
You know.

Speaker 4 (23:17):
That's that's kind of you know how I go about it,
you know. And then you got some people to go
the other way. They start with a theory and then
they start moving around in the system. You know, you're
less like to break something, but he don't get those
learning opportunities. But there's no right or wrong on things.

Speaker 1 (23:32):
Not absolutely absolutely, there's no one way path I feel like.
But but yeah, I think I take the exact same
approach you do, honestly, because I mean, shoot, even now
just I've even gotten into like Python learning that I
got it, you know, Bash scripting, things of that nature.
Things that I was like, Man, you know, I never
really cared about Python or Go or JavaScript and you know,

(23:53):
back and development. But at the end of the day,
it's like it all kind of plays into virtualization, databases
and things of that nature, connecting it together.

Speaker 4 (24:01):
So you also talked about, or you mentioned on v
saying right among monks, but the things one thing I
didn't hear you say it was v x LAN.

Speaker 5 (24:10):
Did you have a deal with the Well, no, you
did say you got the n V certification.

Speaker 1 (24:15):
Yeah, the v c PV.

Speaker 4 (24:17):
What flavor was that? Was that the t n sx
T or was the intersex V? It was the nsx
V Okay, okay, yeah, it was the nsx V. I
know now a lot of people do the nsx T.
I think, yeah, the N sx T is the new
on one. I mean the NX and I think I
believe the pH uh.

Speaker 5 (24:36):
I think v's pribace should be face.

Speaker 1 (24:38):
Yeah, I think yeah, V phased out. I'm pretty sure
V already phased out. Absolutely. But yeah, but as far
as the net like virtual networking get like you said,
v x land, the different cardel ports things that, and
then in v VMware and you got new tanks how
they do their their flavor everybody has pretty much it's
all the same concept, just different names for marketing.

Speaker 5 (25:01):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (25:01):
So, and at this point in your story, you're still
in the Navy over JCSC doing his virtualizations.

Speaker 5 (25:09):
Absolute experience and stuff. Yeah, so I just.

Speaker 4 (25:14):
Did you like at what point, I mean, did you
already knew you was going to be getting out when
you start learning these skills or you still kind of
think you was gonna stay in and be in the
amiral somewhere.

Speaker 1 (25:23):
Yeah. See, that's the thing, honestly, I was. I was
planning on staying in. So at the time I was,
I think I was E six and I just made
E six and I still had like two years left
in my contract before I was at like, I think
that would put me at nine years. So I was
at seven years then, and I was like, man, you
know what, I'm gonna stay in. I just made six,
you know this and that. But then as I was

(25:45):
talking to the other East sevens and and the other
you know, because E seven would be the next right
that I would have to either go for if I
was going to try to go officer, but personally I
like to stay technical, and I was like, man, how
what and what route would I be able to technical?
And the only route was really to be like a
warrant officer. But in the Navy, unfortunately, you have to

(26:06):
be a chief before you can be a war officer.
You can't just go from E six to warrant officer. Really, yeah,
you can't do that. You have to be an E.

Speaker 2 (26:13):
Seven and is now stay up and exactly m.

Speaker 1 (26:20):
Yep. So, and I was like, man, you know what
that would mean that I had to go ahead and
play that role where I just got a babysit people
and I don't really get my hands on the equipment anymore,
and that'll risk me losing my touch because you know
how technology is. You stay away from me for a
year and you don't know what's going on. Yeah, I know, right.
And then but would really solidify my decision on why

(26:44):
whether or I was gonna do that or not is
you know, I ended up getting medically retired from the military.
They were like, hey, yeah, you know, yeah, I did
a sleep study. They were like, yeah, man, you're going
to get medically retired. And I was like, oh, shoot, okay,
well I was already Well no, I actually got diagnosed
with NARK. It's crazy.

Speaker 4 (27:01):
Yeah, I know, yeah it was.

Speaker 7 (27:06):
It was.

Speaker 1 (27:06):
It was a crazy I'm telling it was like a
crazy turn of events. But it was like I was like, hey,
they're just handed me a silver place.

Speaker 4 (27:13):
People that don't know, mhmm, what what is narcolepsy consist of?

Speaker 5 (27:17):
For the people that don't Yeah.

Speaker 1 (27:18):
Yeah, so narcolepsy essentially it's just for me. You got
to you got two types. You got with cataplexy without it.
So with cataplexy, it's people who you know, they're ones
who are like gotta pass out like randomly, like just drop.

Speaker 7 (27:30):
Yeah I wonder said that.

Speaker 1 (27:33):
Yeah yeah, yeah, yeah. So some people they have that
like that where they exert too much energy and like
they'll just like pretty much pass out and drop or
they'll just do it randomly. See. For me, mine is
the the sleep side of it is the fact that
I was always having excessive daytime sleepiness and I would
have these sudden like sleep attacks where like pretty much

(27:55):
I would I would be falling asleep, like you know
in the military if somebody's talking and you're in the
meeting and you dozing all. But that was me every day,
every day for like the whole ten years I.

Speaker 5 (28:04):
Was in the mid the b This lazy mother.

Speaker 1 (28:07):
Yeah exactly.

Speaker 4 (28:09):
Wow, that's crazy and it's a medical condition. Like I'm joking,
but I'm saying that like really could be damaging to
your you.

Speaker 1 (28:20):
Know, absolutely, man, Oh absolutely so.

Speaker 5 (28:23):
I think Goozman had that. Rico.

Speaker 2 (28:25):
Can you remember, I don't know if you heard the
story about him policy on the.

Speaker 4 (28:27):
Road was standing up on the rope. Yeah, and he
broke his rope that was asleep. Yeah, clown will he
broke his arm. He fell down and broke his arm
off a rope, you know, the rope that he climbed. Yeah,
you fell down, of course, yeah, he fell asleep.

Speaker 1 (28:44):
Yeah. Wow, that's kind of.

Speaker 5 (28:48):
Crazy, Yes, Batman, that's kind of crazy.

Speaker 1 (28:53):
But yeah, yeah, honestly, man, it was crazy. But you know,
when they gave me that diagnosis, I was like, all right,
I thought I had to sleep at me because you know,
I'm thinking, you know, I snore a little bit when
I'm sleeping and things of that nature. But they were like, nah,
you got narcolepsi. And I was like, okay, but how
do y'all know that? And they're like, well, we're going
to do another sleep test and I was like, well,
I just did one, Like what else do you want
me to do? So instead of the normal overnight sleep test,

(29:16):
this one was like during the daytime. So they made
me come in the day before and they were like
all right, yeah, you're gonna do the sleep overnight. We're
gonna hook you up, measure your brain, make sure you're
sleeping for eight hours, and you get a good night's
rest and I was like, all right, cool, sounds good.
And I was like, do I just go home when
we wake up? And she was like no, and I
was like all right, well whatever, So I wake up

(29:38):
in the next morning. They hooked me up with everything.
The night before I wake up. The lady was like,
all right, you got an hour. You can go use
the bathroom and get a little bite to eat a
little snack, and then you're gonna try to take a nap.
And I was like, huh, Like I just woke up.
I was like this eight o'clock in the morning. You
want me to take a nap. You just woke me up.

(29:58):
So I was like all right, you know, hour goes by.
I lay down. The dude was like all right, you know,
I'm gonna turn the lights off. He got twenty minutes,
just try to sleep. He was like all right. I
was like, well, okay, whatever, he hooks me up, leaves,
turns the light off. I was like, all right, man,
try to go and get some sleep. I just remember
him opening up the door and come back in and
I was like, bro, like how long. I was like, okay,

(30:19):
like how long? That wasn't twenty minutes? And the dude was like, yeah,
that was twenty minutes, and he was like, did you
fall asleep? I was like, nah, I didn't think I did.
I thought you just walked out and walked back in
and the guy was like nah. He was like, so
you got another hour and then we're gonna do this again.
So we did that five times, back to back to
back to back, so an hour I would do twenty

(30:40):
minute nap, then an hour break, twenty minute nap, hour break,
and I'm thinking each time he comes back in he's like,
did you fall asleep? I'm like, I don't know, man.
He was like, were you dreaming? I was like, I
don't know. So, come to find out, they gave me
the results. I fell asleep on each one of the naps,
every one of them, and I would sleep within one
minute of them turning the lights off on each nap. Wow,

(31:03):
And I hit yeah. And during that time during the day,
I hit my rim cycle. So that's the that was
the real kicker. I'll hit my rim sleep within three
minutes of within three minutes of fall asleep on each nap,
Like you're not supposed to be in rim sleep when
you during the daytime, your body is not supposed to
do that.

Speaker 4 (31:22):
Yeah, so you like, so you like a dude, like, yeah.

Speaker 2 (31:27):
You're supposed to be taking a nap, but you.

Speaker 1 (31:30):
Should exactly like when I'm when I would take a
nap like I was dreaming.

Speaker 4 (31:36):
Yeah, yeah, you will right right to the reil.

Speaker 1 (31:45):
That's the thing about it. So you would think that
I would always be you know, you would always be rested. Nah,
because of the simple fact that my body was always
going into rim sleep like that and it was throwing
my Cicadian rhythm off. My sleep was I was always tired,
like always super sleepy at in like around. So yeah,

(32:06):
I would sleep for nine hours at night, go to
bed at like nine o'clock, wake up at nine o'clock,
and it would be sleepy I'm talking about I can
go take a three hour nap at ten thirty. Wow,
it's crazy, it is. It's insane. Yeah. So they they
diagnosed me with that, gave me some medicine. They were like, yeah,
you know, just take these medas blah blah, and then
the meds ended up being the reason why they medically retired.

(32:28):
They were like, yeah, you can't take these medicines in
the military. And I was like Okay, that's funny.

Speaker 4 (32:33):
Like the narcologic and the narcolis itself wasn't the reason.
It was the medication for the way mm.

Speaker 1 (32:39):
It was the medication that that I had to take
for it. So that's usually how it works.

Speaker 5 (32:43):
What's the medication do is? So?

Speaker 1 (32:45):
Yeah, so they gave me adderall that was the first
one that they gave me, and then they gave me
a nighttime medication also or it's like a two part one.
It's called zyrum. So what's crazy is that when I
got diagnosed it, my doctor was like, yeah, they just
finished a clinical study for a new a new medication
that's supposed to treat your type of narcolipse. And I
was like, oh okay. It was like we'll see if

(33:06):
you know the military approves you know, Trackcare approves it.
I was like, I mean, I don't see why they wouldn't.
It's me. I mean I need the help, right well,
come to find out me, Like he.

Speaker 4 (33:15):
Was, yeah, I'm like, yeah, I'm still active duty right now.

Speaker 1 (33:20):
Exactly, come on out, baby, yeah exactly. Truck Care was
like oh yeah, bro, I mean, like you cool and all,
but but you're talking about this is fifteen thousand dollars
a bottle and it would send me three bottles a month.

Speaker 4 (33:36):
Yes, wow, wow, yes, man, yes expense.

Speaker 6 (33:41):
They were like yeah, They're like yeah, you can go ahead,
and you can go ahead and bounce on that.

Speaker 7 (33:45):
Brother.

Speaker 1 (33:46):
They were like, listen, man, you costing us a lot
of money. And one you can't even work because the
medicine I would take. I had to take two parts,
like I was saying, and you take one dose like
right when I lay down. As soon as I take
that dose, like I gotta wait two hours and take
the second dose. But after the first dose, I'd be
knocked out. I'm talking about I'm knocked out cold. So
I had to set an alarm clock or my wife

(34:06):
would wake me up because I wouldn't even hear my alarm.
I'd be so sleep because of the medicine. And I'd
had to take the second half. But when I took
the second part, second part really knocked me out. So
I basically my leadership and everything while I was in
the military, my last I say, six months while I
was on that medication, Like I had a late report
to work because I couldn't even be up by nine o'clock.

(34:28):
I lived all the way in Riverview, so it's like
an hour drive. So I was like, man, there's no
way I'm making Pete. There's no way I'm making formation.
No way. I'm be honest with you. I fell asleep
so many times walking in boot camp. It was insane,
like it'd be times.

Speaker 7 (34:46):
Why I was.

Speaker 1 (34:46):
I remember we was marching and it was like snowing outside,
and I remember being freezing cold, but I was super tired.
I went from cold to being sweating, and I'm like,
what the heck? And next thing I know, we were
inside the building like we had already marked, like I
think it was probably about half a mile, and I
can't even I didn't even recall us marching.

Speaker 4 (35:06):
Wow, you probably get it, what man, I don't.

Speaker 1 (35:11):
Yeah, I used to. That was the worst. That was
the real kickers. Like I didn't fell asleep behind the wheel.
I got red lights, like I would put my car
in park. I'd have to put my car in park
at red lights.

Speaker 5 (35:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 1 (35:23):
It was bad. It was bad.

Speaker 7 (35:25):
Yeah, somebody it happened to me. One time. I felt better.
Red lights.

Speaker 6 (35:28):
Somebody got out of their car knocked on the window
because I guess I was holding up traffic.

Speaker 1 (35:33):
Yep, yep horns.

Speaker 7 (35:37):
He came up.

Speaker 6 (35:38):
He was like, he was like, I'm like, oh, man,
I can't believe it. I can't believe it happened to me.
But I was driving to Miami and back and one
day and it just messed me up.

Speaker 7 (35:48):
So anyway, so you.

Speaker 4 (35:49):
Say, get married, you ever get into it your wife
and just like pretending to be sleep.

Speaker 1 (36:07):
She knows, she already knows what time. But she knows
me already. She knows me way too well. Like sometimes
I you know, I like I'm asleep or whatever. She's like,
I know you're in sleep. I know you're in sleep.
You're way too loud that quiet. You say, you got kids, right, yeah,
I got to like when they were sleeping you had
to wake up or if you had to hear them

(36:28):
or well that's the thing about it. So I recently
stopped taking the medicine, the one at night because my
daughter was born. She should be two in July. So
when she was born, I was like, yo, I can't
be taking this at night because it's like, I'm out
of the military now. And at this time, yeah, I
was fast forward. I was already out of the military
at this time. So I was like yeah, I can't

(36:51):
take this want and my doctor told him. I was like, yeah,
I gotta be up at night, you know, to hear
my daughter to feed her things of that nature. Because
my wife at the time was still in the army,
so she would still have to go to work and
I was at home. I'm like, I got to be
able to hear, you know, my daughter and things of
that nature. So they took me off of it because
I definitely didn't feel comfortable with having the kids around
and like being that sleep because of simple fact. It

(37:12):
was like I was in such a deep sleep that
I couldn't I could barely hear anything around me for real. Yeah,
So I was like, yeah, I didn't feel comfortable with this,
So they took me off of that, and then they
gave me some other medicine. It was like basically just
up my dosage of add or off for me. Like
they were like, yeah, during the day, here just take this,
and then at night you just take like some other

(37:33):
thing like I forgot what it was called, but I
stopped taking it too because it get me.

Speaker 4 (37:38):
So, since you can't work, are you like tapping into
your security though?

Speaker 5 (37:42):
Yeah, it's.

Speaker 1 (37:44):
No, actually no, Actually I haven't even tapped into any
of that, so I still can work. They told me that,
you know, I got there, I got the disability where
I'm still workable because yeah, I'm still.

Speaker 5 (37:57):
Certain day.

Speaker 1 (38:00):
I know, right, tell me about it, no, man, Yeah,
but so yeah, but uh, you know, I was in
the military, got that diagnosis, got to you know, medically
retire me. So I had all of the knowledge and everything,
all the tech experience from then, all the certifications, and
I was like, man, you know what, I'm gonna just
get me. You know, I'm gonna find me a contracting
job getting out. That was my you know, my goal

(38:22):
to do that. And I'm thinking, you know, I got
all of this experience already, but I didn't realize that
the military experience I had, I had to figure out
a way to translate that to the civilian world because
even though I had the experience, I had to figure
out a way to relay that experience to the civilian
people because they don't understand when you're a team chief

(38:44):
on the mission to do this and you set up
a node for forty you know what I'm saying. They
don't know that tech stuff taps. And that's the thing
about it. So I did. I did do tasks. But
while I was going through TAPS was when COVID started.
COVID was just spiking up, like it was just starting
to get ramped up around that time, because it was
what twenty like twenty nineteen, the end of twenty nineteen.

Speaker 5 (39:06):
For me, So don't know.

Speaker 4 (39:08):
TAPS is a class, a series of classes that we
take on the way out of the military healthy transition,
whether it be converting it to gills over to a resume.
So people don't understand or whatever, So go ahead, Yeah.

Speaker 1 (39:21):
Nah, exactly, that's exactly it. So, I mean I used
the TAPS. They had some good information there, but it
was mainly like it was really rushed through. I mean,
I'm not gonna lie. I really wasn't too I wasn't
paying too much of my attention to the TAPS class
as much as I was, like lind, Yeah I was.
I was, Yeah, I'm not gonna lie to I was.
I was dozing off there. I'm not evenna lie to you.

(39:42):
The only part I have my eyes open for it
was that VA part when it was talking about the VA.
I was up.

Speaker 5 (39:46):
Everybody like what happened?

Speaker 1 (39:48):
I was like, what percentage okay, but yeah, so I
ended up, you know, uh, got out the military. I
was job searching when it did a couple of interviews,
and I'm thinking, I'm like, all right, you know, I
know my stuff. You know, this is my first time
doing a civilian interview though, because I've been to the
military since I was eighteen and then now I was
what twenty seven, So I'm thinking, I'm like, this is

(40:12):
my first like big boy interview, kind of adult interview
with the civilian company. So, you know, I did it.
Things was good. I kind of like, you know, stumbled
a little bit through it. But as far as the
technical side of it, I kind of I got the
technical aspect behind it. It was more so the behavioral thing,
like asking me, you know, what would you do in
these kind of situations, because at the time in the military,

(40:33):
you know, you kind of you know what you're supposed
to be doing, so it's not really a like a oh,
what happens if this happens. It's like, not, I know
what's what I'm supposed to do. I know what to
do when when that happens, Like I'm already prepared for that,
and if it's something that I'm not prepared for then
it's for somebody else. Yeah, so exactly, you have a team.

(40:53):
So I had to understand that aspect and had to
grasp how to pretty much lay the behavior with the
experience that I already had from the military and how
to translate that into what they were looking for into
the world. So I think it probably before I got out.
I got out. January twenty eighth of twenty twenty one

(41:14):
was my last day in the military, and I had
got my I signed a contract, well, I signed my
offer letter with our old employer actually, and Rico was
on my interview for the job. Actually, and the day
prior to that interview, I know, right, the day prior
to that, I had just interviewed with them with another
company and they had actually given me an offer letter.

(41:36):
After the company that I interviewed with you, that you
was working at, that we were both working at, they
offered me. And I was like, man, you know what,
it was, honestly the interview with you that actually made
me want to work at that company because I was like,
you know, this seems yeah. I was like, you know
that I got a better vibe, a better feel, like
I felt more you know, it wasn't like so uptight
like I was being grilled. More so, it was more

(41:58):
so like you know, it was kind of laid back,
can you know, inform on things of that nature. And
I was like, you know, I felt.

Speaker 4 (42:04):
Interviewing like that because exactly that's what I got, you know,
I got like the grill and the third Yeah you
meet somebody's some girls father or something.

Speaker 1 (42:13):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (42:13):
But you know, I try to like because you'll know
you're already nervous, so I try to be personal and
just loose because I want you to I want you
to win.

Speaker 7 (42:21):
You know.

Speaker 4 (42:21):
That's the thing like a lot of people, you know,
just kind of get screwed up when you interviewed for
a job.

Speaker 5 (42:28):
They want you to get it right answer.

Speaker 4 (42:29):
They want you to be the guy because they don't
want to keep looking, you know what I mean.

Speaker 5 (42:33):
So it was it was a situation with me.

Speaker 1 (42:36):
Yeah, and I mean and like I said that that
vibe that I got from there, and I was like, man,
you know what that seems like a place that you know,
I feel like I can I can set some routine,
I can learn from them. You know that I knew
that the team that I was gonna be on was
has some knowledgeable people because of the interview itself. So
went accepted that. Crazy because after I accepted the offer,

(42:57):
I believe it was too much into the job. It
was accepted offer.

Speaker 5 (43:03):
I told my brother earlier it was one month, it was.

Speaker 1 (43:06):
Two it was. So I started. I started November twenty
eighth and the last day, my last day was March first.

Speaker 4 (43:16):
God, so we're talking about it. So we end up
going through Uh, we were going through a he got
that crap.

Speaker 1 (43:25):
Like a bidding. They were bidding for a contract option year.

Speaker 4 (43:28):
We're going through option year, so you have to rebid, right,
And we didn't win. We had been on this work
and we didn't win the option. The guy the organization
that we took, I guess I say we, but they
had already been on the contract when I came on
the contract. They brought me on to kind of help
some stuff because they were getting ready for option year.

(43:50):
But yeah, man, it's sucked man, because he got on
it was like two months and he was doing fucking man.
He was he was like really doing some great work.
Like I just knew we had that. I was like,
this is gonna be this's gonna be a wrap everything
gonna get fixed because I was, so I took the
role I think, I think, I think I told you

(44:12):
guys about this spot. But I took the roads so
I can, like, I want to fix the virtualization stuff
and learn the cloud stuff from the cloud. So I
took the role as a virtualization lead so I could
learn cloud from somebody else because I was in the
middle to try to make a pivot.

Speaker 5 (44:26):
And that's you know, that's how you got to play
it to.

Speaker 4 (44:29):
Figure out what you want to do, and you take
steps to get to it, even if it's an indirect movement.

Speaker 5 (44:34):
But go, I ain't even.

Speaker 1 (44:37):
Nah, absolutely not. You hit it, hit the nail on
the head with that. So and that's exactly you know
where I was like, you know, hey, things happened. You know,
they did end up, you know, losing that contract. But
it was kind of like an eye opener for me
because I was like, you know what, now it's time
for me to let me see what else I can
do or what do I want to find another job

(44:57):
right now? Because I you know, I had just gotten
met a retired. So luckily, you know, things weren't bad.
And my wife was she's in she was in Army
at the time, and then I found out she was
pregnant and I was like, okay, cool, so you know,
all right, just they just.

Speaker 5 (45:11):
Told us you missing around with the military.

Speaker 1 (45:15):
Exactly exactly, so I said, man, I said, okay, cool,
I said, oh man. But yeah, I was like I
was like sitting here thinking, I'm like, man, all right,
you know what, what's my next move? So and you know,
during the time after that happened, I had like a

(45:38):
light bulb moment. I was like, you know what, I
put all my eggs in one basket. I put it
all into, like, you know, my tech experience, and I
put everything in thinking that Okay, you know I want
to get this job, and that's that's my my one lane,
I one avenue. So I was like, all right, you know,
I'm gonna take this time to figure some things out
and try to build some other avenues of income. So
that way, you know, I don't ever feel like I'm

(45:59):
tied to like an employ or, like I ever feel like,
you know, this is an issue for me. So I
actually picked up like I started I've been I did,
like started day trading back in like I said twenty twenty.
So I picked it up been you know, learning, studying,
you know, losing money, making money here and there. It's
an up and down trial and thing. But as time

(46:20):
went on, you know, I kind of got my groove
figured out, you know, a system that worked for me.
It wasn't nothing too create. It wasn't making millions or
nothing like that, but I mean, you know, making enough
to be comfortable to handle things that I need to handle.
That pretty much was it. So I took that, used
that time while I was just doing that on the side,
and then spent some time, you know, made sure the
wife was good. And then my daughter was born, and

(46:41):
then the first year of her being born, I pretty
much was like, all right, you know what, I'm to
stay at home dad right now because my wife is
still in the army going to work every day. So
did that telling right now? I give all. I got
an all new look for stay at home mothers and
anybody who does the stay at home thing, because I'm
telling it is not it is not easy. Even if

(47:03):
I mean it's not easy, it was, it's not and
especially like and like it's nothing against like women or men,
but I feel like as a man, like you always
feel like you want to provide and if you're not
like really providing, Like granted you're providing for your child
because you're taking care of them, but that's a nurturing
role and that's kind of like the mother role. Like
mothers do that. Well, men, we can do it. Absolutely.

Speaker 5 (47:25):
Feel about that though.

Speaker 4 (47:26):
Like having that feeling that you just can't control, you
know what I mean, because most people say.

Speaker 5 (47:32):
Oh, that's trauma or whatever.

Speaker 4 (47:35):
They make it feel, make it feel like it's something
that's broken with you. I mean, do you feel like that?
I mean, because I feel the same the same thing. Yeah,
but I don't have a problem with it personally. I
just curious about you.

Speaker 1 (47:48):
Yeah. No, I mean it's not like really a trauma
thing for me. It's just more so on the lines
of a like I did it, and I can say
that I did it before, and you know I didn't
complain about doing it. I mean I didn't. It wasn't
it wasn't my ideal situation, I guess I'll say that.
So at no point was I comfortable doing that. So
I knew it wasn't a long term, It wasn't no

(48:08):
longevity in me doing that. So it was like, all right,
now that I know what that feels like. I can.
I got a different appreciation for my wife when she
turns over and she becomes to stay at home mom,
you know, because that's the role. So I told her
she was gonna take what she got off the military.
She's out now, so yeah, so I feel like me
doing that, it kind of gave me a nice view
and so that way, I didn't really take things for granted,

(48:30):
and I can understand, you know, where her you know,
maybe you know where she's feeling stressed out about certain things.
Because if you haven't done that role, it's easy to
look and be like, man, you're just you're just at
home with the kids all day. You're not really doing it.
But it's like, nah, it's a lot more to it
because you don't really ever have your own time.

Speaker 4 (48:49):
I'm back here a little bit. He mentioned what you
mentioned your wife in the military. What is she doing
in the military with her job.

Speaker 1 (48:58):
Yeah, so me and my wife we actually met them
my last year at JCC. She does it work also,
well she did. She's now a real estate agent, so
she's got a real estate license and she's been doing that.

Speaker 5 (49:10):
So she didn't really enjoyed it. The way you enjoy it.

Speaker 1 (49:15):
Yeah, she was like, man, you know I liked I
t but she didn't really really want to do it.
Like right before she got out, like I want to say,
probably like maybe a year, not even a year before
she got out, she had just got her her ch
the news. She took the new c Yeah, she just
got her seat. Like she's extremely smart, like I'm talking
about will learn take any extremely smart like when it

(49:36):
comes to learning, really good with that. But just she
just didn't enjoy it. So I was like I can
understand that. I can completely understand that because I told her.
I was like, if it's one thing I'll tell you.
I was like, when we get off the military, we
got our own life now, so don't you don't got
to do nothing you don't enjoy. And that's one thing
that I was like, I'm not going to do.

Speaker 4 (49:56):
You's let's unpick that, Reggie.

Speaker 5 (50:00):
You got some MS right then?

Speaker 4 (50:01):
That kind of I mean, is that like make you
feel some type of way you feel like she betrayed
to take.

Speaker 7 (50:08):
Nah, well well I'm gonna go back. I'm gonna go well,
well I'm gonna.

Speaker 6 (50:17):
Go back and yeah, nah well no, nothing like that, man,
I'm just you know, first, I'm gonna go back and
I'll tell you the kid thing. You know, I love
my son. I professed my love for him all time.
I kiss him on the forehead. I said, that's so,
and I love you. But you know what, sometimes I
want to punch him in the face. I'm just gonna say, man, hey, man.

Speaker 7 (50:38):
You know what, I want to punch him in the face.

Speaker 5 (50:40):
I don't.

Speaker 6 (50:41):
I don't punch him in the face, but I want to.
So I get you, So I get you with the
kids stuff. But you know, yeah, hey, but but but honestly.

Speaker 4 (50:52):
You know, we just say Reggie's son is eighteen, so
he's not a shill.

Speaker 1 (50:58):
I don't mean kids.

Speaker 6 (51:00):
I don't mean nothing, man, Reggie said. The difference is
Reggie wants to punch him in the face. He doesn't
punch him and he wants to.

Speaker 1 (51:09):
Yeah, it's a difference, but but no, I just don't
get it.

Speaker 6 (51:18):
The I T thing, you know with your wife though,
you know that's that's shocking because it seemed like she
was really good at it. Though, you know, I just
I just feel like a lot of people, I mean,
you're not She's not the first, right I see a
lot of people they're really good at something like I
T and they make money, so they just kind of
bear it out. But it takes a lot of it's

(51:40):
really brave to be like, you know what, I'm not
doing what I like and I just kind of want
to just do something different even though I'm really good
at this.

Speaker 7 (51:47):
So that's that's a bravery. That's brave.

Speaker 5 (51:50):
It's brave, especially when they in their groove. Man is
a lot higher than people.

Speaker 4 (51:57):
Oh yeah, oh yeah, trust me, Like you keep getting
certified another thing.

Speaker 1 (52:03):
Yeah, exactly exactly. I mean they got their own little
expenses that are kind of they pile up. I ain't
gonna lie, but I told her. I was like, man, listen,
you're you're doing real estate. I was like, if that's
what you enjoy doing, if that's what you're gonna be
happy doing, I'd rather you do that. Thann feel like
you need to do it. You don't have to do it.
I was like, I can do enough for I do
the I T stuff lead the I T to me.

Speaker 7 (52:25):
But in the b the bravery is kind of what
to make.

Speaker 5 (52:31):
Braver. I get sleeping man, so.

Speaker 1 (52:39):
Now I got to see I got the sleep. My
sleep is good in my mind. You know, I'm not
really falling asleep like that no more. You know, the
meds usually they keep me up.

Speaker 4 (52:47):
So you you you talked about pivoting over into the
stocks to kind of like do something and keep yourself
occupied and make some some pretty good money, I'm assuming
at the time.

Speaker 5 (52:58):
And then did you go back into tech or and
what else were you doing?

Speaker 4 (53:03):
I'm not sure if you like working, If you like so,
I see you guys some some nice gear that's not
like geared people use, you know, like you know, you know,
Facebook Messenger with yeah, people like that. Are you making content?

Speaker 5 (53:16):
Yeah?

Speaker 1 (53:16):
Well yeah, absolutely so. At the time, I wasn't making
any content.

Speaker 5 (53:20):
You know, a competitor.

Speaker 4 (53:21):
You got a podcast, No, I don't got to, man,
I swear no, No, I don't got a podcast now.

Speaker 7 (53:29):
Swell yo, I'm gonna see you on these internet streets.

Speaker 1 (53:34):
It's like I can't have a five Yeah, nah, man,
I'm not doing that. I'm not doing the I can't
do the podcast. But yeah, I got the set up.
I got everything, you know, I like to I'm big
on quality. And then, you know, aside from the stocks
and everything too. Back in twenty nineteen, like right before
COVID hit, I had set my own business so to

(53:57):
do my own it consulting because my you know, my
cousin like, hey man, you know you should always just
have that in your back pocket because you know your
knowledge can translate, you know, you can always monetize that
that way. And I was like, all right, cool, So
I got that that way. And then during that time,
you know, I was you know, I would navigate here there,
do a little client consulting here. You know, they're nothing too,
like nothing really permanent.

Speaker 5 (54:17):
And more so homes. Small businesses.

Speaker 1 (54:20):
Yeah, it was a lot of It was a lot
of small businesses mainly that just because of simple fact
like the small businesses I can I could travel to
their office like maybe like a small it's like one
of the annexes for like a doctor's office or something
like that. They would call me in if they needed
some help or something like that, or I would kind
of help them if they were thinking about what they
want to do as far as like like backups and
disaster recoveries for their information and stuff like that that

(54:42):
they had there. And some of them were looking at
like beef up their network. And that's when I honestly
got a lot of networking calls and people more so
asking me stuff about networking things, wanting to increase their
bandwidth and this and that, And I was like, Okay,
it really wasn't much of the server side, like I
want into until like recently I did a lot of
the kind of like cloud consulting because a lot of

(55:04):
people are trying to move to the cloud. Now.

Speaker 4 (55:06):
Yeah, so so what made you? What makes you decide
to start a business? I mean some people are kind.

Speaker 5 (55:11):
Of yeah, they're just it's different.

Speaker 4 (55:14):
It's a different mindset, you know, go from being somebody
on the nine to five to somebody that's actually building
a business system or a business.

Speaker 5 (55:22):
I guess business.

Speaker 1 (55:24):
Yeah, absolutely, I say, honestly, just because I wanted to
have like just to have another avenue to take you know,
I had another another lane that I can go in
that I can always pivot to when I like in
for instance, if I didn't have a job, like at
the time I didn't and kind of like now also
so but after the job, you know, after we I
was part of ways and my daughter you know, spent

(55:46):
the time doing to stay home and dad, I did
get back into the it the it field again at
a hardware company called Class, But we did a lot
of like small form factor networking switch is server modules,
you know, tactical, a lot of edge use case stuff.
So I actually got a job offer from them, and

(56:06):
probably about like I say, about three months after I decided,
I was like, all right, you know, I'm gonna come
back and get a job after the year was up,
signed with them as a system integration architect. So at
the time I'm like, all right, you know the job description.
I was talking to the director, me and him, we
talked to we did the interview, and he was telling me,
you know, it was like really virtualization heavy hyper perversion
infrastructure because they have the the server blades, a lot

(56:31):
of that. So we worked with a lot of the OEM,
the Dell, we worked with Google, we worked with AWS,
had a lot of partners because the military and the
other organizations that would buy the hardware, they would use
that their software, and you know, they're gonna use the
cloud in conjunction with the edge silver blades that we

(56:51):
have and that we're selling. So I did a lot
of like cross organizational talking and that was fun. That's
that's where I was like, you know what, this is
the side of it that I really like. I was like,
you know, the the engineering side is fun the back
and then you know, and you're pretty much behind the screen.
You know, nobody's bothering you unless you got trouble tickets.

(57:13):
But the real, like what I really enjoyed was in
that role, I was really customer facing. So it was
more so like a pre sales role because I was
building out demos, proof of concepts, going to these tech
be trade shows, doing demos for different customers, going traveling
to customers, helping them you know, set up and start
integrate their our equipment into whatever system that they're using.

(57:34):
So there was a lot of client interfacing with that,
and I got to really network a lot with the
with a lot of people in the industry like at
the at Dell, VMware, you know, a lot of the
software companies also New Tannics, the Scale are things of
that nature. So I felt like that job was that
was like what kind of opened up my eyes to
where I seen my future at with with tech being

(57:56):
in tech. So since then I was there for about
six months. Unfortunately, you know, the New Year hit back
in this January. They did a reorganization, and I'm talking
about I had already I mean during my six months there,
I mean I'd been hitting off every check mark in
the book. I mean during that time. I also got
my my AWS Solution Architect cert also too during that

(58:20):
time while I was there, just because you know, I
was like, I'm working heavily with the cloud now, so
I need to get a cloud cert. So did that. Unfortunately,
you know, they did the reork. They were like, hey,
we're gonna be cutting the whole engineering team because they
had just put the team together. Yeah, they cut our
whole entire team so pretty much. And I was like,
all right, well, you know, back to square one again.

(58:41):
So I'm trying to figure out, now, this is what
I wanted to do because I enjoyed that role, and
I was like, this is this is the it. I
want to find another job that's kind of like, you know,
in line what I was doing here. So I was
interviewing for like like cloud architect roles and cloud engineer roles,
and I interviewed that did well on the interviews, the
tech interviews, and you know, I was telling them, you know,
kind of like what I was looking for. But a

(59:02):
lot of those roles. I was like I realized, I
was like, man, like, all of these roles are like
really like behind the scenes, like I'm not really doing
what I really wanted to do, like the customer kind
of interfacing with the like the pre sales sales engineer
type roles. So and that was until I realized that
what I was doing, I wasn't really a system integration architect.
I was really a pre sales engineer kind of like

(59:23):
sales engineer for a hardware company. That's essentially what it was.
And I had no clue what those what a sales
engineer or pre sales engineer even was. So I thought
there's some research on it. I started targeting roles like that,
and it kind of like led me to where I'm
at now, to where like I'm kind of not really
actively applying, but more so just like networking building relationships
with these different organizations that may have these positions opening

(59:46):
up soon because I know the state of the market,
how a lot of people are you know, cutting jobs
and people are budgeting and you know the whole Now,
I get it absolutely, So that's why luckily I'm in
a position where I don't have to rush into a job,
I don't have to hurry up in find somewhere the
work to get things handled because I'm already I was
already prepared for if this was to happen again.

Speaker 6 (01:00:05):
So I got a question for you. So, you know,
for people like me, right, and I don't know if
Marco and Rito kind of falling and Kenny fall into
this way, but I kind of been like one stable
company for a long time, so navigating through multiple jobs
and all this other stuff, what's your approach to when

(01:00:28):
you say, Okay, this is ending, what do you do next?
Because I'm sure a lot of people in it might
suffer from that. I'm blessed enough or lucky enough to
keep having the same be with companies for a long term.
So tell us kind of what you do. Okay, like
jobs ending, what's your approach next? What's your strategy? How
do you go for?

Speaker 1 (01:00:48):
Yeah? Absolutely so for me, so since after my first
time losing my job, you know, I was really I
really wasn't prepared, so it was kind of like a like,
you know, a shock for me. So learning from that,
the way I positioned myself even in my last job
is you know, I always wanted to make sure that
I was always staying up to date on LinkedIn, I
was always staying active. I was always, you know, staying

(01:01:09):
in touch with my network, staying up to date with
my technology knowledge, you know, studying for CERTs even though
already had the job, getting certifications, making sure that my
resume was still up to date. Because at the end
of the day, when I realized that at a company,
when I'm trying to get a job, I'm technically the product.
So I got to be able to market myself. And
in order to do that, I got to position myself

(01:01:30):
to where I'm always marketable. I don't want to If
you stay ready, you don't have to get ready. Essentially, ye. Thanks,
So that right there, that pretty much like that helped
me a lot with being able to to handle the
bad news of you know, having a transition, so then
being in that state of mind already going into it
when I got the news, of course, it's not something

(01:01:51):
I wanted to hear going into the new year. I
was like blindsided by it, honestly, but at the same time,
it was like, all right, cool, my game plan now,
all right, what what kind of roles am I looking
to target?

Speaker 7 (01:02:02):
All right?

Speaker 1 (01:02:03):
Where am I at now, how soon do I need
to get a job? Do I need to get a
job this soon? And those are all the questions that
I had to ask myself because depending on those answers
kind of depends on how you need to move. Because
if you're on a buyd to where you need to
financially you need to get a job, then you you
want to start looking at maybe something that may not

(01:02:24):
be what you're sort of looking for at the moment,
but it's something where you can get into and pivot
while in there at an organization, you can always do.
That's always a I always tell everybody that's a safe
rout when it comes to I t if you can
get in somewhere, pivoting like laterally or within the organization
is always way easier than trying to get into somewhere,
way easier.

Speaker 4 (01:02:44):
So so with you in your situation right now, how
do you how do you keep yourself sharp?

Speaker 5 (01:02:50):
Bro? With your.

Speaker 1 (01:02:52):
Absolutely? Yeah, So for me, I do a lot of
like like home automation things like that, got my own
home projects. I just recently just redid my whole home
network with all ubiquity stuff. Yeah, yeah, when Biquity.

Speaker 8 (01:03:08):
That's what I got you run any service.

Speaker 1 (01:03:11):
Yeah, actually I run. I got prox maks you know
run now, you know, got that going up. I had
a couple of little I was running Terodactor and I
was trying to run like a couple of gaming servers
out of a container, just playing around with it, just
trying to see how it worked. I didn't really like it,
just because you know, the latency was insane for me.
But other than that, it's just you know, playing around
with stuff, just having funt.

Speaker 3 (01:03:31):
I had installed prox marks and I said, yeah, I
can't do this, and yeah seven. I got three hosts
with seven on them. So okay, I think I'm gonna
go back to just to mess with it. Yeah, you
know I've been I've been really open source heavy. You know,
I'm not gonna lie to you, like since kind of

(01:03:52):
leaving away from the jobs when you when you're not
working those those licenses are a little expensive. So you know,
I got a I had. I want to say, I
got my workstation twelve. I think VMware workstation twelve on
my computer right now. I've got that. And then I
got a couple of Intel nexts.

Speaker 5 (01:04:11):
I just got to do it. When knock around in
the most.

Speaker 1 (01:04:15):
Yeah, what do you say with a home assistant? So
that's the thing about I've been looking at the home
system because that's what that's my next move, and that's
why I kind of upgraded my network equipment because I
was like, man, I want to start doing some like
smart home automations with home assistant things that.

Speaker 3 (01:04:32):
Nature, because that's what I'm doing right now because I'm
replacing Google and going straight Apple.

Speaker 8 (01:04:38):
So I like an article that I can share with you.
I've seen somebody do, Yeah, yeah, drop that.

Speaker 5 (01:04:45):
What's happening in.

Speaker 1 (01:04:45):
The Yeah, absolutely definitely.

Speaker 8 (01:04:48):
I had.

Speaker 1 (01:04:48):
I had to swap those ruckers aps out there, man,
because I couldn't even pick up. I wasn't even getting
one Wi Fi bar outside of my porch and my
access point is literally down I got one downstairs and
one upstairs on the ceiling. I was getting barely. I
was barely getting any bars in my room. I was like, yeah,
that's not gonna cut it.

Speaker 8 (01:05:04):
Yeah, I have some something similar.

Speaker 3 (01:05:06):
So I have one up sales on ceiling, and I
finally brought one downstairs and wait to my backyard.

Speaker 9 (01:05:11):
So yeah, yep, yep, everything, I'm all the way outside
with it. Perfect I'm outside exactly, yo, t Im outside
So yeah, no, but no, you know what, I'm impressed
with those like Knucks too. You got the ones, look
the little hard drive work stations.

Speaker 1 (01:05:32):
Yeah, I got that.

Speaker 7 (01:05:33):
Yeah.

Speaker 6 (01:05:34):
Yeah, I'm I'm like, man, I'm looking at like this,
like full blown, like filing cabinet for a computer I
got next to my desk. And the fact that Nucks
is doing doing it like that, you know, I'm just like, man,
I saw it online.

Speaker 1 (01:05:50):
But you know, yeah, man, they're super customizedble too. Oh yeah,
they are server on it.

Speaker 7 (01:06:00):
Yeah.

Speaker 4 (01:06:01):
I was looking at getting a few to you know,
make some make some cooponages coo.

Speaker 1 (01:06:08):
Yes, you know that's what I used myn for couple
of them.

Speaker 6 (01:06:11):
You can stack them up just like a bunch of
hard drives on the side of your desk.

Speaker 1 (01:06:14):
It's real easy, yep, I mean honestly, yeah, yeah, real, yeah,
I'm saying.

Speaker 5 (01:06:24):
Cool.

Speaker 7 (01:06:26):
Ye could you bod not for it?

Speaker 1 (01:06:28):
It's just expensive, you know. But I tell everybody, I'm like, man,
if you're gonna get one, I would by the parts, Yeah,
at the parts.

Speaker 7 (01:06:37):
If you.

Speaker 3 (01:06:39):
Question for you, Steven, how would you how would you
get yourself out with your personal business you was just
handing cards or you're just talking to people.

Speaker 1 (01:06:47):
It was made for me, just me just talking to people, honestly,
networking through LinkedIn a lot of that. You know, I
would search, you know, pretty much searched through seeing what
kind of businesses and what people were with companies were
in the area on LinkedIn, and then going through doing
the Google search also too. I had I was running
some Google ads at the time too.

Speaker 3 (01:07:05):
So I'll tell you you aren't lining about network because
I did like five customers.

Speaker 1 (01:07:10):
On retation and I did a wireless uh information.

Speaker 3 (01:07:14):
For a hotel, and there's a lot of them, and
I did a lot of them with Ubiquity, So it
is a lot of networking. And now they are cloud stuff,
which luckily I passed my WS and December, so now
the knowledge still fresh and I'm not helping them out
with that.

Speaker 1 (01:07:26):
So exactly, Yeah, I'm curious once who got me into
the there.

Speaker 6 (01:07:35):
They're like a lot of Now I was gonna say,
there's a lot of like, uh, I guess websites to
do I guess, uh, freelance type of work for I
T stuff.

Speaker 7 (01:07:48):
Do you ever use any of those? I'm wondering and
if you do. Which ones do you use?

Speaker 5 (01:07:52):
Up lift?

Speaker 8 (01:07:52):
I think it's one work work market, uh Field Nation.

Speaker 7 (01:07:57):
It's a lot of them. Yeah, do you use any
of those? Curious?

Speaker 1 (01:08:01):
Honestly, Nah, I don't really use any of those because
I mean, I'm not gonna lie to you. I'm not
gonna say, like I my business is like, oh, that's
the forefront of like where I'm looking to make money at.
It would be more so like a one off, two off,
you know, every now and then. It's not nothing to
where like I'm gonna make a living off of just
that business. But it's just it's another avenue for income
for me. So it's like, you know, that's how I

(01:08:23):
look at it for real, honestly, because as long as
I don't have to, I try like to do too
too much because I don't like overloaded my plate. I
do like to have like my free time to play
around my toys that I spend money on and have
fun with my kids and stuff.

Speaker 4 (01:08:37):
And what kind of work are you like when you
do jump back out there, what would you like to
jump into? I know you don't want to be like
behind the scenes, right nah.

Speaker 1 (01:08:45):
Nah, So now I'm I'm targeting them like pre sales
and sales and neeer roles. I've actually I've done a
couple of interviews. I'm in like the late stages of
the interview process for a couple of different companies right
now and just gonna see. You know, I did realize
that when you do pivot to this that field, the
interview process is a lot longer because it's a lot

(01:09:07):
more personal. Like you're gonna meet with everybody like I
met I'm talking about I've did like three technical interviews
with the team members that I met with hiring managers
and met with vps and the directors and it's like, man,
I'm like all right, I'm just constantly. Yeah, it's like
it's really a personality thing and they always just talk
and it's never really like, you know, the question that
going to ask a really scenario based a lot, and

(01:09:29):
you know, they just want to see how you operate
in certain situations because when you're dealing with people in
that customer role, you're gonna come across these different personalities
that you got to figure out how to mend with.

Speaker 5 (01:09:41):
What did it say? The what did they say? The
travel situation?

Speaker 1 (01:09:44):
Was like yeah, so the thing is a lot of
them say the travel is usually like around like maybe
fifty percent at the most, which I'd say my last
job that I was at was pretty much that I
was gone. I'd say about at least one week a
month I was gone during my whole six months I
was there, So I was traveling pretty often.

Speaker 4 (01:10:03):
Yeah, you're you're gonna be good with that. Man, You're
gonna it sound like you're probably miss them kids.

Speaker 1 (01:10:08):
Man, No, no, no, no, no, It'll be all right. Now,
it'll be fun because yeah, especially because the simple fact
that like now it'll be a lot easier with my
wife not being in the military, like we can really coordinate,
like because the one beautiful thing about those roles I
will say is this is like the work life balance
is really really up to you, like how well you

(01:10:29):
organize organize yourself, like how well you prioritize and like
you know, instructure your time throughout the day. Because I mean, honestly,
I would you can put eighty percent of your effort
in the twenty percent of your work and then you
can get the keep results just because of simple fact
that when it comes to that, everything is like moving

(01:10:50):
in stages, so you're not you don't really have to
rush into like, Okay, I got a deadline to get
this service up the mind, It's like, nah, because I
still got away from customer. We might have to do
another discovery call to figure out that this, and we
can have to do a proof of concept. So it
allows you that flexibility to where I may travel for
that week and work that week straight, but when I
come back those three weeks, I might be just jumping

(01:11:12):
on a call one today for like an hour. So
it kind of balances itself out from what I noticed.

Speaker 4 (01:11:19):
And Yeah, like when we worked earlier, for whatever reason,
I thought you had like a YouTube channel, it's.

Speaker 5 (01:11:25):
Like working real good.

Speaker 4 (01:11:27):
Yeah, you're really good at like explaining it is working
now in downtown camp together.

Speaker 5 (01:11:33):
Oh yeah, you would.

Speaker 4 (01:11:35):
You were like on a level you know, with tech
as far as like your skills and also being able
to convey this stuff at a at a high level
where it's suggestible people that aren't ask technically you know
in client but you know, getting especially we're gonna be
doing that kind of stuff like demos and stuff.

Speaker 5 (01:11:54):
Man, getting you getting your brain out there like that.
It's gonna be huge for you.

Speaker 1 (01:11:58):
Yeah, definitely. I I'm working on something right now. You know,
I got a little something in the word to hopefully
it'll be you know, I have everything up and running
within like the next couple of weeks or so. I'm
definitely thinking about, you know, making some content and getting
some videos out there, just because of the lane that
I'm taking. Like you were saying with that, a lot
of it is, you know, demo is virtual and the
videos and you know, your presentation skills and just about

(01:12:21):
having that YouTube channel. Even I from not really demoing products,
it's just more so showing uncomfortable like how comfortable I
would explain and talking about technology. And I feel like
a lot of companies looking for those roles. They want
to see that in that person.

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