Saturday, September 27, 2003

Norma Udell organized a barbecue for former Western Farm Credit Bank employees last night at a park in Fair Oaks. Most of the group were the IT employees that worked together during a period from 1987 to 1998, but some non-IT people also attended.

In addition to the usual suspects like Joe Larkin and Sherry Bell, the group included, but was not limited to Anita and Jeff Boone with their two boys, Manuel Codero, Chris Doherty, Charles Guenther, Robert and Jennifer Goolis, Dave and Irene Hackett, Tom Harper, Ray Jerd, Don Jones, Mary Kessler and her youngest, Kelvin Kishaba, Lynn Lamothe, Cinda Lewis, Bill Markley, Dan Mattos and his wife, Dave Newlin, Karl Okamoto, Patti Rabe, Terry and Dan Richardson, Carlos Tillmanshofer with his wife and kids, Helga White and Steve Wike. I am sure that I have missed more than a few.

I spent a lot of the time talking to George Beitzel. Although I have tried to figure it out, I am not sure when I last saw George. Beitzel originally hired me at the banks in October of 1980 and is responsible for giving me the opportunity to be the Vice President of MIS for the banks in early 1987. Beitzel had a big influence on my professional development during the 1980's.

While the 1980's were a pretty stable period personally and professionally when I got a chance to get some mentoring, the 1990's were a decade of trial by fire, including an ugly divorce, the Texas boss from hell, the Alltel outsourcing, continuous child custody battles, a second marriage, the merger with the AgAmerica Bank, the Perot outsourcing, starting a new family and the job switch.