I have made some mistakes in this life, but who doesn't there is no manual or instructions. So back in 1984 I went to school to become an Electronics Technician. Met a nice young lady, and found a job working for Americas leading manufacturer of computer input devices, life was good. We had a son, and bought our first home, an older fixer upper, we were well on our way to living the American dream. She finished school and started working and we sold our old home and moved into a brand new house that we had built in 1994. This is where problem number one started to rear its ugly head. The company I was working for was in its biggest slump ever, a hotshot corporate exec was brought in to make the company profitable for the shareholders. I was one of those people that had stock in the company, so that sounded great to me.

So the new CEO started to liquidate all the assets he could in order to turn the tide. He then tried to use automation to lower assembly costs. When I started working for the company they had about 1500 employees in our local area. The reductions in force soon started as buildings were sold and robots took over. I was lucky and was offered a job in the Test Engineering Department, I had to build more test equipment for a new plant that was opened up across the border in Mexico. Soon I had built enough equipment to start up an assembly line in that other country. This ment more reductions in force accross the company, and soon I was told my services were no longer needed. I figured I should be able to find a job as a technichian, but found out all the other tech's that were laid off before me held those jobs.

So now I find myself without a job and a wife that is totally freaked out. Her answer to the problem was to divorce me and move on. Now I don't have a brand new house to live in and no job to boot. Being the survivor that I am I head off into the wild and start siding houses during the housing boom that was just starting. This worked out great, it wasn't the easiest work out there, but I sure felt like I was leaving a mark with all the houses I helped to install siding on. After seven years of working for someone else I decided it was time to invest some of the money I had made into some siding equipment and go out on my own as a siding contractor. $10,000 later I was in business and working on all sorts of homes using all types of materials, some of the homes I worked on were worth millions of dollars. I was once again happy and carefree.

All of a sudden all my contractor friends are finding to much free time on thier once very busy schedules. Two weeks later it seemed as though the world had stopped turning the housing market had hit a brick wall. Having a little free time and a few bucks in my pocket, I started riding my dirt bike a little more to take my mind off what I needed to do next. Unfortunatly that turned out to be a bad thing as a bad wreck shattered my collar bone and required plates and screws to put me back together again. So arm strapped to my side and told to not lift anything heavier than a fork full of food while the bone heals, and they heal slow when your 47 years old, I try to figure out how I'm going to get myself out of this fine mess. Well the surgery pretty much cost me everything I had in the bank, all I had was my new truck and a bunch of construction equipment, the market for both of those was pretty much a big goose egg. I managed to get myself into a program that would send me back to school, as I now needed certification to be a technician, in other words I would be tested to make sure I was keeping up with the new technologies that were coming out.

I was just recently given a job that I am allowed to work 5 hours a week on computers, workstudy at the school campus where I attend. I am hoping this is the last time in this lifetime I have to pull myself up by my bootstraps. I love what Chickenfoot is doing to help the growing number of needy people that live on American soil today. Keep rockin and keep helping, the fat cats that run this country will never look out for the people, thank God you fine people will. God bless and good luck.