Well, I don't need to rant so much today, because Brandon has already done so, and quite well.
My manager and his wife had their first baby Sunday morning (all participants are healthy, baby is suitably adorable), so I'm the company tech guy for the time being. Naturally a bunch of stupid unsolvable problems crop up in domains outside my primary skillset: bizarre database results that delay a mailing list post for marketing, system configuration problems that require asking tech support for help, two different projects waiting on random external people to do something. This simultaneously makes me think I look like an idiot, and makes me want another job, where the stupid unsolvable problems are at least in a domain where I can really work on them. I wouldn't do that, of course: leaving the company now would be a pretty serious bridge-burning move. ("I realize I'm one of two engineers and the other one just had a baby, but I'm bored and I want more money, so...good luck!". Not really my style, and not conducive to a good reference.)
I went book-shopping Sunday, and picked up In Search of the Warrior Spirit, by a teacher I've met a few times who spent six months teaching aikido and other self-awareness disciplines to two Green Beret units. He's part of the CAA family, longtime friend and student of my teacher; as it happens, the copy I bought was owned by some people I know from the dojo, and has their name and address on the inside cover. It's good, if kind of bizarre and not always the easiest read.
I'm thinking now about the ways in which I perceive my life to be slow or stagnant, and what kind of change I really need or want. The first step, I think, is to get back to basics and restore a rhythm to my aikido training that has me going more than once a week. It's not killing me, I think I'm okay on a maintenance level, but I think I'm bored with this round of being crabby and not training. Movement starts from within; regular training will let me open up so other stuff will happen. (I don't claim to know what, and that's not really the point, but if I'm truly open to it, change will happen, and nothing could possibly stop it.)