“Lessons from a veteran.” Ow, doesn’t that just make you want to duck and run? Trust me, I didn’t come up with the first part. Being called a veteran is a lot more attractive than the dinosaur label I put on myself more than 10 years ago (already!). Being a dinosaur is what it felt like, though, being at least 10 years older than my colleagues and having started in programming long before many of them were even born. From the Seven Seas to Bits and Bytes My career started in 1985, the week after I graduated from nautical college. Yes, I was trained as a ship’s mate. I loved…