Motorcycle

Yes, if you didn’t know, I bought a motorcycle. My desires for a motorcycle go way back, but it was heightened by a recent trip to Utah. I had planned on taking a few roads that I’ve never been on, mostly fireroads, but I had read about a few that I really wanted to take. One was the Cottonwood Canyon Road, which turned out to be closed, and the other was Hell’s Backbone. This road was unique in that it was the first road into Boulder and the bridge was around 8000ft with sheer cliffs on either side. Going up, the road turned spongy, as it was a very wet spring, and as I turned around one switchback, a 4ft boulder was blocking the road. I squeezed by that rock and mumbled how I would have never had that problem on a bike.  After conquering that road, I took another road that I had taken a previous trip and on the downside of that, I was shifting down thinking that if I die would just be because the darn car weighs so much that I couldn’t stop in the mud. I took other roads too which I probably shouldn’t have, but that is the way it goes. The point was, I wasn’t having nearly as much fun as I should be having just because I was in a car.

I’m not sure the exact day I had the thought to finally get the thing. I remember coming up to Tracy and saying, “I’m gonna have a mid-life crisis, and it involves a motorcycle.” To my shock and amazement, Tracy said yes. So, I had asked some people at work about a nice bike to have, one that could spend most of the time on the road, but one that I could take on dirt and fire roads as well. I was suggested that a Suzuki V-Strom would fit the bill. I looked at one at a local dealership and it was a longer bike than I was expecting, but the clearance was higher and the engine was something I thought I could handle. Done. I debated on it for a few days and sleepless nights and decided to do the deed. I bought the bike after letting the family look at it and they gave their approval. They delivered it that evening.

So there it sits in the garage. Not doing much at all. The next day I looked at the Motorcycle Safety Foundation’s site and found a number to call about their classes. One of my promises was to take a class before I hit the road and before I had my license. There were two more classes remaining and if I cared to walk-on, I could at least try. So that Friday night, I walked into the class, and sure enough, I got in. One of the advantages of buying so late in the season was a good deal on the bike and being able to take the class that most have to wait months for. The class occupied my entire weekend, one that featured birthday parties and assorted appointments and also a talk by my wife in church. I had to miss all of that. The good part is that I passed the class with a perfect score outside of a downshift that didn’t happen. I put my foot down on the machine, but it had a lot of shifting issues those two days.

My real reason for writing this was to let you know about my apprehension on this purchase. You see, being a motorcyclist, like being a bicyclist, means you are part of a group, with their own clothing, language and other cultural byproducts. I usually don’t want to partake. I want to wear normal shorts when I bike. I don’t want to become part of that sub-culture. I don’t want to talk about my bike or talk about the options or whatall. I just use things for transport and for this, just to enjoy it. So during the first night I met my instructors. One was a grizzled old gentleman who had some scars from biking that he didn’t mind sharing. The other instructor was a middle/youngish woman who had her arm in a sling and also had difficulty walking. She had a motorcycle accident two weeks previous when the power-steering on her bike (uh huh, power steering) and she slammed into the guardrail at 65 MPH. Great. I’m gonna die on this thing. What the heck am I thinking?

The next morning, we were on the grid and the helper came riding a motorcycle and she was wearing chaps. Now, I had to stifle any thoughts I had about “buttless” chap jokes that I had swimming around my head. I realize they serve a very good purpose, but again I thought about being part of this culture and all the stuff I had to deal with there.

Anyways, I will soon have my certificate, which will allow me to get my M-class on my driver’s license. Then I’ll be legal. Well, after I get insurance…gear…nerve…

I hope I don’t kill myself on this thing.

A Beautiful Weekend

I’m taking some time once again to let others view our sad and weary lives. There were some highlights this past week, to be sure, but mostly another disappointment in trying to find some rest and relaxation.

A few weeks ago, we decided to take a few days off and finally do some family camping this year. This year has been abnormally cold and wet, even when I took my trip to Utah it was so cold and wet that I couldn’t do what I wanted to do there. I figured that sometime it would clear up and I was getting pretty sick and tired of being stuck at home and inside. It would make for a busy week, but I was so anxious for change that I didn’t care.

Monday was the first sign that it was going to be a challenge. Tracy had tickets for Peter Gabriel at the United Center and I was to stay home with the kids. It had become more of an effort to find someone to babysit than it was worth so there ya go. I had made dinner for everyone and was actually surprised that they were eating it. You see, the two younger boys don’t seem to want to eat anything other than chips and ….well, nothing else. They were actually eating the sandwiches I made! I know, it isn’t that original and kind of a cop-out but these kids don’t want anything of a culinary challenge, so why go through the bother. It wasn’t too long before Madsen decided to throw up all over floor. Luckily, it was on the hardwood and not the carpet so clean up was easy, but Madsen was pretty out of it for the night. He had to make a few runs to the bathroom as the night wore on. One thing that struck me was how much the last 10 years had suppressed my gag reflex. There was a time when I would be losing it along with the kids, but that doesn’t happen much anymore. I just looked at Madsen while he was losing it with the parental rush of trying to comfort him and thoughts about how I was going to clean it up and what I needed for that task. Tracy and I, as we often do, were trading IMs and coping with all it takes for us to be parents in these times away from each other. The rest of the evening was uneventful for me, but that was the calm before the storm.

My next few days I was in pre-vacation mode at work. That usually means that I don’t change that much in my programs or code, as I’ll be unavailable to fix it. Mentally, I was already off. Like I said, I didn’t have much rest and relaxation during my Utah trip and I was really looking forward to spending some time in the woods. I always am a bit hesitant on these trips because I know the kind of pressure this puts on Tracy as the kids are relentless on her attention. She usually has to do much of the packing and planning and the work she does while we are out and about always amazes me. I never take her for granted in times like these and I try to read her moods and frustrations so I can do something to ease them. The children make camping a completely different experience for her from what she experienced when she was a kid and when we camped extensively when we were in college. I wish I could make it more enjoyable for her and about the best I can do is keep the children away from her so she can get a bit of a rest.

I was also keeping an eagle eye on the forecast. The early forecast showed a partly sunny day on Thursday and sunny the rest of the weekend. Perfect. Temps in the mid 70s. The reservations were made, right next to the lake. Should be a good opportunity for playing with the kids and all manner of foolishness. We didn’t need to be out the door early Thursday and we were going to give John a good chance for work on the bathroom without constant interference.

Thursday early morning began the disaster that this camping trip was to become. Bennet decided that he was going to be sick all that morning, and throwing up was to be his mode of demonstration. Tracy handled it with all the patience that I could ever expect. Motherhood is amazing to me. I honestly don’t know how they do it, all the demands made upon them. Almost a full decade without a full night’s sleep would have made me madder than a hatter. Even as the morning progressed and Bennet was visibly better, it didn’t get any better for me. I started feeling uncomfortably sore as if I was also sick. I wasn’t nauseous like the kids have experienced, but it wasn’t a good feeling. We packed up our gear and left to go to Rochelle first to watch a few trains. I also wanted to go along Illinois 64 to see what kind of terrain the bike path I wanted to take with Hayden looked like. I was uncomfortable the entire way. I had taken medication to see if it would stave off whatever I was experiencing with little success. The forecast also was glaringly wrong. It was cold with a constant mist. I was so desperate for a week away I was willing to tolerate it though. Upon arrival at the train park, the kids went off to play on some equipment and I got the chance to stretch out and try to take care of my drowsiness. I did get to see a few trains and I did feel better after some rest.

We found our campsite at Rock Cut with little to no issues. I still wasn’t feeling up to par but we got the tent up. Madsen was filled with energy as usual and was trying my patience also, as usual. He is told something and it seems he immediately forgets it. The kids were also tracking mud into the tent which then drove Tracy nuts. Certain levels of common sense aren’t all that common right now.

So, in our rush to get out of town, we didn’t have a whole lot in terms of supplies. We drove out of the park and were surprised with the number of stores. We searched for a grocery store...none. We stopped at a Target. Above the door there were pictures of food and we joked that that didn’t necessarily mean that there was actually food for sale there...and there wasn’t! We drove around for several more miles and were not greeted with any more opportunities to buy food. Considering how many grocery stores surround us at home, I was rather shocked at the lack here. We did find an Aldi and bought some food. So okay, we need to plan better when it comes to assuming that a town of several tens of thousands of people has grocery stores.

So here we are. We now have food and the kids are getting a very quick and harsh lesson on how to act in a campground. And it is raining. I wish I could muster up some disappointment but I’m feeling so bad all I want to do is lay down and go to sleep. Tracy knows that I’m not feeling well so she pretty much leaves me alone, but the kids...oh, the kids. They are constantly whimpering and complaining on how the have to go to the bathroom (pit toilets, the horror!) and get a drink and non stop complaining. If I wasn’t so darn tired I’d do my own discipline with them, as I was highly annoyed. How Tracy handles it, again, without losing her mind I just don’t know. For example, it is wet outside so we tell the kids that they can’t go into the tent without taking their shoes off. It only takes us about 20 times to drill that into their heads. One one of the many trips to the bathroom, Madsen puts his shoes on inside the tent, which crossed our own limits of patience but then goes on to step on Tracy’s and Bennet's pillows!.....Anyway, Madsen begins to complain about a sore stomach and all I think is that he is once again suffering for attention. Ellie then begins to complain and before much else happens...”I think I’m going to throw up. That gets all our attention. Tracy fumbles at the door and manages to get her out of the tent before she purges all of the day’s food and drink. Barely out of the tent, mind you, right in front of it. So now we have the chaos of a sick child emptying her stomach at the door of the tent, the rain falling and the small, backup son complaining about his sad life. We take into consideration that I’m also not feeling well and the forecast changing to be cold and wet for the next day and decide that it just isn’t worth it. We fire up the lantern and pack up. While we are doing a crude job of folding the tent, Madsen loses his battle with his stomach in the car. He tried to catch everything he could in the towel but it didn’t do the complete job. We just weren’t prepared for all the vomit that struck us that night. It was a quiet drive home.

I didn’t feel good the next day either. We set up the tent and took a hose to it and I spent most of the afternoon and evening in the bathroom. It was a beautiful and wonderful few days off.

Come Saturday we prepared to head up to Oshkosh for Nathaniel’s and Mandy’s reception. We had to think about what might come our way considering what has happened previously in the week. Still, it was Nathaniel. We had to go. So we went up and had a good time. I was the only one that went up in shorts planning to change there. When I came back, Carrie looked at me and said “You clean up real nice.”  “Yep, but I can’t seem to convince Tracy about that.” I responded sarcastically.

Trying to control the kids in our pastime. I took several trips outside to hunt for bugs with Bennet to keep him occupied. When the time came for the throwing of the bouquet, we made Ellie get into the group as she was “single”. She really didn’t know what to do about that. I whispered to Carrie that if Ellie actually did catch the bouquet, there would be some ticked off girls there. During the dance, Becca danced with Bennet and Bennet just loved it. Layne mentioned that he didn’t know what to do with all the left overs. If I had felt better, I would have eaten more, but I didn’t and I’m trying not to eat so much anyway. Other than that, it was a good time. The crab/pasta salad was terrific. I hope Nathaniel and Mandy have an exceptionally good life together.

Sunday I didn’t do much. I stayed home with Ellie and Bennet while Tracy went to church. About three pm I had about had it and I told Ellie to get ready for a bike ride. We rode down McDonald to the bike path, across to Randall and south to the forest preserve. Ellie mentioned once that she was “bored” but as she was getting into the car to ride back with Tracy, she gave me a hug so I know that even if she was bored, she enjoyed the trip. Tracy mentioned that she talked all about it on the ride back. She had fun.

Great weekend, huh? I don’t want many more like it.

Happy Father's Day

This is my second draft on this particular post. The actual experience of Father’s Day changed my story quite a bit.

I was going to have a nice pseudo three day weekend. I was going to work at home on Friday and then camp out with the kids for the weekend, just good father’s day stuff. It didn’t work out that way. A routine generator test on Thursday at work turned out to not be that routine. The Uninterrupted Power Supplies (UPS), that cover power to our servers if a power outage hits and before the generators kick in, decided to break. Thursday afternoon turned into a struggle to find out all the servers that were down and my Oracle RAC cluster decided to not work any longer. Those might help the user but are no end of trouble for administrators. I finally left work at about 6pm, which isn’t that bad for other mere mortals, but that makes about 12 hours for me. I woke up on Friday with an email that all work at home was cancelled and that everyone had to come in. That turned into another 12 hour day. They decided to have several people do shifts to cover for any power outage. The theory was that many servers wouldn’t come back after a power outage and someone needed to call the team as well as start all the services up again. I “volunteered” for the 4am-10am shift since I am usually up then anyway. While I wasn’t expected to “work”, but just be there, it was uneventful but not all that fun. The rest of Saturday was uneventful. Tracy went and spent the day with Madsen and I did wrangle a cheap breakfast at Ikea with the family before we went our different ways. The rest of the day I spent trying to recover some of my lost sleep and do laundry. Tracy did come home at about 6 and I was able to spend the rest of the evening with her.

Sunday morning was another horrible morning. I woke up at two and wasn’t able to get back to sleep until around 6. Bennet had wormed his way into the bed by then and he seemed to be concentrating on kicking and scratching me the rest of the morning. When I finally did fall asleep, I just had a nightmare about losing Bennet at a parade. I figured that it was some sort of divine lesson to learn to appreciate the child that was scratching and kicking me.

I spent the next few hours getting ready for church feeling nothing be sorry for myself. I didn’t want to be awake, I didn’t want to wear these clothes, I didn’t want to go to church, I didn’t want to deal with any other living being. I admit I was feeling very selfish. I knock myself out at work and this was “Father’s Day”. I’m not one for holidays but this fit into my mood. I didn’t want to deal with anything. My day, let me use it the way I want to.

Then I thought about Tracy. Yes, I was being selfish but this woman had given up the last ten years of her life for these kids. She has to deal with my whining and the endless demands of these children. Over the past 10 years, she has had 4 small humans invade her life. She almost died with one of them. Both of her parents have died in the past decade. She had nursed her mother to health, moved her to Illinois and let her be there for the birth of her last grandchild. She didn’t want to deal with these situations any more than I did but she still does it. Who am I to be in such a state? What do I have to complain about?

No, Father’s Day didn’t work out the way I wanted it to. Tracy spent the day painting and fixing dinner. I folded clothes and had my daughter bake me cookies (yet another thing that Tracy really did but it gave Ellie something to do for me). I biked with the kids to the corner and rented a redbox movie. That was pretty much the extent of what I did. It wasn’t what I wanted to do for the day, but my life isn’t about me, is it? I might not do much, but I am there for them.

Happy Father’s Day.

Our First Families by Laura Lindley

OUR FIRST FAMILIES LAURA LINDLEY 1954 LEELANAU MICHIGAN

OUR FIRST FAMILIES by Laura Lindley. Private Printing, 1954. 1st Ed. VG. Stapled wraps.
History and stories of early families in eastern part of Leelanau County, Michigan. Surnames mentioned include CORE, DUNLAP, GREILICK, GROESSER, LINDLEY, MEBERT, NORRIS, REINCKE, REVOLD, RICHTER, SANBORN, VOELKER, WEISS, many more.

I scanned the book into pdf and I can help out anyone that is looking for this document for genealogy purposes.

Adjustment Bureau

Rating:	★★★★
Category:	Movies
Genre:	Science Fiction & Fantasy

My favorite movie reviewer can be found here.

http://www.ericdsnider.com/movies/the-adjustment-bureau/

Now understand, this is the first time out to a movie with Tracy in well over 8 months. I wanted to get a good one, but something that would interest us both. Snider mentioned that “This is exciting, thoughtful stuff, overall, and at its core deeply romantic. “ SOLD!

Ok. I’ve read a lot, if not most, of Philip K. Dick’s stuff. I’m sure I read this story, but I can’t remember it off hand. He also wrote Minority Report and even having read that, found little in common with the movie. So, while the author interested me, I can’t trust Hollywood to make a good adaptation.

I found the pace to be good. Some of the excitement was contrived as the story didn’t suck me in that much. General Zod made an appearance, which was a plus. The acting was very good. It made me believe the characters.

Since I am a complete, die-hard romantic, I had to chuckle at the line one of the Adjustment Bureau’s agents said when he found out the main character was still trying to find this particular girl. “Three years of riding the same bus every day. What kind of person does that?” I think that is an understatement when it comes to matters of the heart, which is why most in the audience also laughed. Perhaps some thought it was about the daily grind, and that lots of people ride the same bus every day for a lot longer, but I knew better. That isn’t hard for me to imagine at all.

Good flick. See it with a friend.

Waiting for Superman

Rating:	★★★★
Category:	Movies
Genre:	Documentary

We watched “Waiting for Superman” yesterday. While we homeschool, I have heard that this film is something to watch. I did have some reservations as the director also did “An Inconvenient Truth” which I do not accept the premise.

Tracy and I homeschool for a variety of reasons. Our first interaction with the school system here with our children labeled our oldest, something that we didn’t want him to have to live with. Tracy’s interaction with the school system in a work related setting was far from stellar. My reasons are probably less concrete. I had a bad time in my seventh grade, and was put on a specific track. It took me 4 years to get off that track into the college prep track. I was not reacting well to the lesser demands and I needed the challenge. My middle school years I considered wasted because I was so labeled. I didn’t want my children to have to face that, the whole institutionalized feeling of the system. In one class where I tanked my first grading period, history if I recall, I put my mind to overcoming whatever the heck was keeping me back, only to be accused of cheating by the teacher. (Certainly someone can’t change that much just by applying one self.) Ideologically, I have problems with the entire setup. My worst teacher, who was completely disengaged and hostile, I found was the union leader. I went through a couple of strikes. My father, an accountant, told me to not cry for the teachers, that they were well paid but couldn’t elaborate due to professional ethics.

The movie is sobering. It wakes you up to how bad off our children are in this system. I bordered on rage when the film went to the lottery where children were selected to go to the charter schools that are in their districts. Each politician, school board, etc. should be taken by the scruff of their neck and made to watch and experience the hope and grief of these parents and children are made to go though just to get the education that they are paying for. It is criminal.

I recommend the movie. Every parent should watch it. Every taxpayer should watch it (especially those in Wisconsin). Every teacher should watch it. It is a condemnation of the system that the adults have built for themselves. And it is about the adults. I want to gag each time we talk about “the children”. Stop it and grow up. I know what education costs. We do it. We pay extra every year, even though a significant amount of my money each and every year goes to the public schools.

Some take-aways. The television is going dark. The kids will read more, write more. Their education will become our focus. We will stop wasting time and money on things that don’t matter. It will be more of a life-style change than I was contemplating, but that is life. It doesn’t work out sometimes the way we plan, but what is important, if not the education of our children.

For another review, try
http://www.ericdsnider.com/movies/waiting-for-superman/

Nerd Convention

Trying to explain to our five-year-old daughter how much computers had changed, my husband pointed to our brand-new PC and told her that when he was in college, a computer with the same amount of power would have been the size of a house.

Wide eyed, our daughter asked, “How big was the mouse?”

 

I have had conversations like that with my own children. Hayden just can’t fathom it. I mean, my phone now has more power than I care to think about. My first purchased computer was 16MHz with a 100MB hard-drive. My phone has higher resolution, is 500MHz and has 16.5GB on flash memory. I work with servers that have 16 cores, 24+ Terrabytes of harddrive space. Unbelievable.

I showed my dad my phone, and mind you this was over a year ago. I flipped out the SD card, you know, the one about the size of a fingernail, and said, “That is 16GB.” He remembers his first computer that filled a room and it had 16k. My first embedded projects used micro-controllers with 4k of memory (and you can be surprised with what you can do with 4k.).

A colleague here at work whispered to me out of our small lab…”Take a look at this.” He was setting up a 2U 24TB disc array with 24 SAS drives with a 6 Gb/s output. My data warehouse has the same amount of disk space but a slower bit rate and 12 drives. This was quite impressive. Pretty soon, others in my group were looking at it, doing all the questions, “What is redundant?”, “What kind of power does this use?” Just then our manager walked by and said “What is this, a nerd convention?” Yeah, but it wasn’t too long before he was squatting down looking at it and asking the same questions.

Matt then cracked open a server. Now, I haven’t looked at the guts of the 1U servers in quite a while. I haven’t had the need. I’m the one that tries his darnedest to heat them up. It is very impressive what they look like. They are very engineered. No waste of space. The heat sinks are compact and the fans were positioned at the front, which surprised me. It had space for 12 memory dims. I just can’t get over how much things have changed over the years I have been in this industry. What is even more surprising, is that I still can bring a system to its knees. I still can saturate a network. I have more computing power than I ever contemplated, and it still isn’t enough.

Anyway, those are some of my thoughts. Not much, but you aren’t paying for them either.

Groesser Family Humor

Some Groesser humor to keep for the ages.

Setup: Our house has a central 2 story foyer and the rooms spoke off from it and the “hallway” of the second floor is open to the foyer with a banister looking down to the first floor. I liked the house because it was so open. My childhood home was actually a mobile home so I didn’t want my house to be just a series of rooms. Plus, you can yell, excuse me, “talk” to anyone in the house by standing in the foyer and having 4 children makes this a great thing.

I wanted to talk to Tracy more or less in private so we retired to the master bedroom but our two year old, Bennet, would not have any of that. He kept running in and out of the room with his imitation of various animals. Now, Bennet is at that age where most of what he does is cute. I couldn’t get any serious conversation going with this kid constantly interrupting being so blasted adorable. Tracy realized that nothing was getting done so she handed him something and told him to take this to Madsen. He wandered off to the railing and threw it down to the first floor. Tracy and I looked at each other with the knowledge that this kid isn’t going away.

Bennet: BLAHM BLAHM!

(Blahm Blahm is Bennet’s name for Madsen. No idea why.)

Madsen: WHAT?

Bennet: (pointing to the first floor) THIS!

Realize that this all took place at a high decibel level. I know some of it can be lost in translation but we laughed pretty hard. He’s figuring out how to foil our efforts to be alone. That and he’s seen us throwing things at each other up and down the foyer and is taking up the torch. I just hope he doesn’t pick up Hayden’s “sniper mode” with the Nerf gun.

The other item of note is when Tracy and I finally did get to talk; I was sitting on the bed and she was sitting in her dad’s rocking chair. She grabbed her thigh and struggled to talk. What I heard her mumble was “Not the word, not the word” or something like that. When she did find whatever she wanted to say, “I wanted to say ‘debilitating leg pain’ but the only word I could think about was ‘decapitating’.” Well, that isn’t a good vision, my wife’s leg hurting and having her head fall off. I really couldn’t figure out how to explain that to the police. “Officer, she grabbed her leg and her head fell off. I didn’t have anything to do with the gruesome sight before you. I don’t know what happened. “ Yeah, we sometimes have a morbid sense of humor. I watch enough forensic shows that I tell Tracy that she can’t die in a peculiar way because I’m the first one they will look at. I can’t take care of our kids with my being in prison, you know. Anyway, I suggest if you do have a decapitating leg pain, you get that checked immediately.

Musings on the Universe.

I have some musings on the universe. How’s that for a topic, eh?

I’m one of those that likes to look at the stars and at least try to understand exactly how insignificant we really are. This came up on Astronomy Picture of the Day.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fKTu6B4Rgek

This puts things in perspective, doesn’t it?

Then there is this. I didn’t like this one as much, but it is interesting.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAVjF_7ensg

How they use redshift and calculate distance has always been iffy to me. It doesn’t seem to ring true, mathwise. It seems distance in the universe is always inconsistent. How can something be farther away than the size of the universe, or how we can look in any direction and see the formation of the universe. Space and time just don’t seem to make sense to me in that regard. For example, the idea that galaxies are fleeing from us at greater than the speed of light. The relativistic effects of that astound me, as well as the energy involved. How light can be determined to operate at those speeds, well, it appears to be beyond my pay-grade.

I once came upon a theory that red-shift isn’t a constant, but is quantized. If that is the case, then you can’t use redshift to determine distance. Distance wouldn’t be quantized. I read this on Wikipedia.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Redshift_quantization

If that is the case, that we are only seeing filaments and stars and galaxies within filaments…that makes some sense, but I’m still dubious. I guess I should be used to not understanding things by now.

Zoo, and all that other stuff.

I’m trying to find an outlet for all my nervous energy. Looking at me, you might wonder what nervous energy I could possibly have. Well, I have it. Believe me on this. I’m trying to become less of a burden of those around me, you see. That is one reason why I’ve been cramming another programming model into my skull, so that I have an outlet. Well, not actually. I’m really trying to find a way to dynamically present data to my company in a meaningful, comprehendible manner. So that is why I’m trying this Silverlight application stuff. That and a professional curiosity is driving it. It is making me delve into graphics, which I have historically sucked at, as well as animation and other items. I’ve always wondered how flash worked but I couldn’t afford the tools to do it, or at least, do it right. Buying a Microsoft product at work is an easier proposition, plus I can leverage all that I already know.

So here comes the disappointment. I’m banging away, getting a handle on what all this is about and I get to the part about data presentation. That is what I want. I knew that it uses web services to bring in data, and that is fairly straight forward. Javascript is the underlying mechanism the client uses, I think, to bring in the data into the object without forcing a server call, like traditional html or scripting. So most of the examples I see use SQL Server, of course. I like SS, however it costs about 5k a pop where I work and we have a site license for Oracle. I hate Oracle. Still, it is what the company uses if it can, so I have to accommodate my training for that. Then most of the examples don’t merely use web services, but things like the Entity Framework, or more advanced web services, like WCF and WPF. Great, I finally have to figure out what that stuff is. Can’t delay that any more. So, I crack open my Books24x7.com account and start searching for a good text.  I start reading about it and conclude that I can really use this. This is actually some very good stuff…Wait for it…BUT, oracle doesn’t support it. I’m frustrated and ticked off. Once again, Oracle comes through and sucks. Now I have to think about what my alternatives are and how to change my thinking back to the more traditional .Net scripting and procedures. Keep that Silverlight in my back pocket for now.

It has been warm all week, relatively speaking. All that snow we had from the blizzard is now gone. Only a few spots and piles of snow remain. I figured that since Thursday was going to be so warm, that we could take advantage of the free admission at the zoo. So off we went. We had a good time. The last time I was there, I think, was another free day. I took the three kids and off we went. We had 6 inches of snow that day. Had a miserable time. This time was significantly different. Hayden was his moody self and the other kids were bouncing all over, like normal. They had moved the bears around to the other side of the park and created a decent habitat for them. Bennet was completely freaked out by the tidal pool in the Seas pavilion. They have greatly reduced their bird displays, which was disappointing. They did see the dolphins and Bennet saw his dolphin toy being made in those plastic press machines they have scattered about. The lion roared frequently, and while Hayden was “standing” by it, no less. We have that on video somewhere and I’ll post it when we find it. Overall, it was a good day.

Friday I had a surprisingly simple day of mirroring databases. I guess that is what happens when you become more familiar with a piece of software and can see what it is doing conceptually. Databases used to scare the crud out of me, mostly because it is so simple to screw them up. Now, I can handle most of the day to day stuff. The rest of the day, aside from a database failure that was easily remedied, was devoted to report generation for some customer that we have coming up. It requires a whole new set of servers and, of course, reports, and I’m just beginning to see what the data and background processes need to be. Boring stuff for most anyone, I’m sure. It’s my job to be interested in it, so I am. Once again, I collapse at 8:30 and once again, I’m up at 3am. Sometime I will get some sleep, at least more than 6 hours. Some wonder why I get to work at 6am. This is why. My whole internal clock is off.

One of the more amazing things is with Bennet. We’ve been having trouble getting him in bed, or rather, having him stay in bed. Tracy figured that maybe he needed a pillow, and that seems to have done the trick. Yeah, maybe he’s just getting older and doesn’t want to wake up as much anymore, but we’re sticking to the pillow story. Tracy, for the first time in over a decade, is finally getting to sleep through the night. At least, on those nights where she isn’t running around at all hours with certain people from the ward, that is.

 

Zoo, February 2011

Mission....

http://new.music.yahoo.com/rush/videos/view/mission--41179774

I thought of this song a couple of days ago. I was watching some indie movie and a particular piece of dialog, a letter actually, between the two main characters. It was striking at how much I was affected by the words. The characters were nothing special, a lonely middle aged man who befriended a teenage girl, but the man tried to express his own longing, his desire to have children of his own, and his own failings…that is what impressed me. It was a wonderful piece of dialog. I certainly can’t relate, having children that sometimes I want to place in a box in the closet (family joke).

The song is by Rush, my favorite band, and by my favorite lyricist, Neil Peart. That he too is amazed by the things around him is not lost on me. The album is old, and it came out while I was on my mission (Danbury, CT) and it was the first thing I listened to when I was released from that task. It was a particularly emotional time for me but a time where the songs on the album really connected. This song in particular is strongly emotional for me. I struggle with finding the words to write, to express what I feel. Or, I have a program or task running through my mind and I can’t sleep until it is out, on paper or running on the computer. I guess I have a little of the creativity mentioned myself.

I especially like this line.

“We each pay a fabulous price, for our visions of paradise”

I really like that line.

Below, the full lyrics of the song:

 

Hold your fire
Keep it burning bright
Hold the flame 'til the dream ignites
A spirit with a vision is a dream
With a mission

I hear their passionate music
Read the words that touch my heart
I gaze at their feverish pictures
The secrets that set them apart

When I feel the powerful visions
Their fire has made alive
I wish I had that instinct
I wish I had that drive

Spirits fly on dangerous missions
Imaginations on fire
Focused high on soaring ambitions
Consumed in a single desire

In the grip of a nameless possession
A slave to the drive of obsession
A spirit with a vision is a dream
With a mission

I watch their images flicker
Bringing light to a lifeless screen
I walk through their beautiful buildings
And I wish I had their dreams
But dreams don't need to have motion
To keep their spark alive
Obsession has to have action
Pride turns on the drive

It's cold comfort
To the ones without it
To know how they struggled
How they suffered about it
If their lives were exotic and strange
They would likely have gladly exchanged them
For something a little more plain
Maybe something a little more sane

We each pay a fabulous price
For our visions of paradise
But a spirit with a vision is a dream
With a mission

Eric's Depression

I read an article this morning from my favorite movie reviewer, Eric D. Snider. I’ve followed Eric for some time and he graduated from the same college as I did, but a couple of years back. I have an autographed book of his somewhere around here. Anyway, this article wasn’t his normal fare, but darn well worth it.

http://www.ericdsnider.com/snide/the-great-depression/

I HIGHLY recommend you read it. I also wrote a blurb about depression a year or so ago,

http://groesser.multiply.com/journal/item/99/Depression_Thoughts.

It wasn’t nearly as well done as Eric’s.

I want to be a little more forthcoming on this topic. I don’t think my depression spells are chemical, or biological. I think mine are situational. I can feel them coming on and I know the triggers and I have ways of coping with it. Luckily I’ve been able to handle them. I don’t know what it would be like with a biological issue. I’ve never taken medication for it but then I don’t know how seriously it was taken back when I had it.

I’ve learned lately that it is best to just say what is on your mind, come clean so to speak. I didn’t know what told me that what I had suffered from was depression. Probably my wife…you know…telling me it was depression. Eventually it sunk in and I somehow think it was my idea and a brilliant deduction.  It was the worst two years of my life, and some here can catch the reference. Actually, it was a damn horrible year followed by a mighty hard go. I had driven away my closest friends and strained other’s. I dreaded opening my eyes every morning. It was hard to function. I was slowly being crushed and I felt I had lost everything. In the moment I was finally faced with all that I had done, all that was happening to me, I decided to change my situation, even if it completely messed up the plans I had made for my life. Well, to be honest, many of those were already shot. Well, situations sometimes have other factors, so I was left with changing my attitude, my reason for going on. I had a bad year, but I made it through.

Once I returned to BYU, I was highly functioning again. Luckily, all this happened away from school so I didn’t completely submarine my chances at a good education. What followed were some of the best times of my life, ones I’ll always remember. Dating like there was no tomorrow, operating on little to no sleep, jamming differential calculus and transistor operation into my head, programming….ah, structured programming; it clears my head like no other task. Aside from a short blip of indecision on where my life was going, it all fell into place.

I’m glad I had that year away, to get it all together. I met some of the most wonderful people then, Park, Noelle, Eric, Bebee, Hecking, Griffith…the list goes on. 

Still, don’t neglect depression. See someone about it. I was in a tough spot because of my situation and people didn’t want to pass judgment on that choice. Professionals tiptoed around it. But my situation isn’t yours. If you think you have a problem, do something. Life is too short to mess around with it. Life is too short to not be happy.

Darth Bane: Dynasty of Evil

Rating:	★★★
Category:	Books
Genre:	Science Fiction & Fantasy
Author:	Drew Karpyshyn

Amazon details and reviews.


I like the Old Republic books. They are an interesting read, with the chance to get away from the characters from the Star Wars movies. This was a very quick read for me, and somewhat predictable. Bane was a bit more calculating and the other characters were a bit more flat. Only a few surprises, and those not attending the plot or arc of the books.

It did seem to me that this book was rushed. It just wasn't as sharp or insightful as the previous books. Perhaps I'm just losing interest in the franchise. I have read most of the books. The New Jedi Order books really did put me off. That was a depressing chain of 18 books, with absolutely no resolution or happy ending. It has colored my thinking. I know there are books by certain authors that I don't read because those authors just aren't interesting. Also, some fairly key elements in the previous books didn't seem to make their way throughout the whole universe yet, or perhaps some authors don't want them to color their notions of how the SW universe should act.

Interesting book, continues the arc. I'll have to wait for a further book to see if it actually is pivotal or not. It does have the potential.

Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man

Rating:	★★
Category:	Books
Genre:	Romance
Author:	Steve Harvey

Warning. Adult themed content.

OK. I read a “chick book”. I had stumbled upon Steve Harvey’s second book at the store and I took a look. I only read a few pages and was amazed that he was so insightful. I couldn’t find the book at the library so I reserved it (I want to read the Tom Clancy book first and I hope that comes in first, (and it did this morning!)) and I checked out his first book, “Act Like a Lady, Think Like a Man” instead. It promised to be a fast read. I’ve always been fascinated by relationships. It might be because I’m married to a marriage counselor, or it might be that I flamed out so often when I was dating and I try to reconstruct it. It might be that I work with computers and I like the randomness of people. That might also explain my fascination with forensics, the merging of science and people with an extreme randomness. I don’t know. I do want to see how normal or abnormal I am. I keep trying to convince Tracy that we have a dysfunctional marriage but she isn’t buying it. Darn it, that just makes getting a divorce that much more difficult.

http://www.amazon.com/Act-Like-Lady-Think-Relationships/product-reviews/0061728977/ref=dp_db_cm_cr_acr_txt?ie=UTF8&showViewpoints=1

Anyway, I want to review some things on the book and perhaps provide some insight into my own twisted world.

His first comments on love are interesting, and pretty close. Men and women don’t love each other the same way. The focus of the book is for women but there really needs to be a companion book for the men. He places a lot of emphasis on women adapting to men and little to no time on how men need to adapt to women. I understand that considering the focus of the book. Still, it isn’t descriptive for all men. I know I’m a bit different than the man he seems to describe. Still, I have a pretty successful marriage of 22 years. He places emphasis on Profess (a woman the man is proud to have), Provide (the need of a man to provide for his family), and Protect (The need for a man to protect his woman/family). He spends a lot of the book justifying those things. For the most part, he does describe men and the way we think, but with some differences, at least for me.

First, I do like intimacy, and not just the physical kind. The non-touching, non talking man that he describes isn’t me. At least, the non-public me isn’t described well by the book. I can give a determined scowl to most anybody but at home I’m different. I’m chatty, loud and a general nut. I like to hold my wife’s hand, mess with her hair and talk for hours on topics that have no relevance. So, the stoic male assumed by the book isn’t me, but you would never know by my public behavior.

Second, I’m not as much a “fixer” as described. I wouldn’t think about making changes in our home without Tracy’s input. While I do have the advice behavior, meaning, don’t bring up a situation where you don’t want a solution. I will try to fix that. In other things around the house or the environment of our family, Tracy is the authority. I’ll take her direction, but I won’t do anything without her approval. If you want a new dishwasher, pick it out, have someone install it (‘cause I won’t do it right) and I’ll pay for it. If you complain about the dishwasher, be prepared to do what it takes to fix it but I won’t pick it out for you. It is your house. I’ll make sure it is operational, but you need to do the selection.

He does give some good advice about how to properly date a man, to set the tone of the dates. I can’t fault him there.

His statement of a man’s needs was also accurate. Our needs are very simple. Support (2 pages), Loyalty (1 page), Sex (6 pages). He was accurate in how much time spent on each too. Sorry to reinforce stereotypes, but stereotypes are there for a reason.

“No-brainer. Men. Need. Sex. We love it. Ain’t nothin’ on this planet like it, nothing else we want that bad on a continuous basis, nothing else we simply cannot live without. Take our house, take our job, the ’69 Impala, our last pair of gators, but please—puh-leeze—don’t hold out on the cookie. We don’t care about anything else; we need the cookie. We need to be physically engaged with the woman we love, the woman who is loyal to us and supports us, and the way we do that is by making love. …But please understand: the way we men connect is by having sex. Period. It’s how we plug in, recharge, and reconnect. I don’t know of a man who doesn’t need this . Ask any guy if sex is important in a relationship and the one who says no is lying. I just haven’t met that guy yet. When you meet him, let’s get him in to the Smithsonian—he’s that special and rare. But the rest of us men? We need sex like we need air.” (page 43)

Some other good excerpts:

“Why don’t men like to cuddle after sex?
Because we’re hot. We’re exhausted. We put in a lot of work, we’re sweaty and burning up and we just need you to hold on a minute before you come climbing over to the our side of the bed talking about holding something.” (page 215)

“What is the international man signal for ‘I’m no longer listening to you’?
Once a man gives his answer to whatever question you’re asking (or he thinks he heard, even if you never asked one), he’s probably not listening to you anymore. Your cue is when he gives an answer. As far as he’s concerned, his solution will fix whatever it is you’re talking about, and if you’re still taking after that, he’s not listening anymore.” (page 225).

I liked the book, but its value is dubious. Like I said, he doesn’t talk for me. I’m not his ‘typical’ guy. Still, to have this from a comedian…but I guess behavior is what comedians notice.

Citizen X

Rating:	★★★
Category:	Movies
Genre:	Drama

This movie was an alternate rendition of the story previously reviewed, "Evilenko". I must agree with other reviewers on Netflix. This is a much more watchable, realistic presentation of the story.

It begins with several bodies being found in a field and the soviet authorities not knowing what to do with a situation such as this. Officially, there are no serial killers in Russia so the establishment refuses to offer much help. The story progresses and is culminated by the lead detective doing his job over several years and profiling the killer.

In the end, a psychologist reads the suspect his profile on the killer and when the killer corrects him, they obtain a confession.

This was a very watchable film and was an interesting movie. If you aren't interested in forensics or detective shows, it probably doesn't offer much to you, but it does provide insight into what could be Russia's most notorious serial killer.

Holidays, 2010

Well, another holiday season has come and gone. I hope we all feel better for it.

For me, the time off started on December 23rd. Nothing much to mention. I did take Ellie out to lunch with me once. Evidently, I got her on an emotional day. I was rooting around looking for money and Ellie asked me if I needed to borrow some money from her. I chuckled and mentioned it to Tracy. That wasn’t the thing to say. She started to cry, thinking I was making fun of her request. So, that didn’t start the lunch date well. We went to our local high-brow Taco Bell and I made the fatal mistake of ordering for her. She liked tacos, so I ordered a gordita. All it really is is a thicker taco. That was the next big mistake of the day. So, my alone time with my little girl really turned into a cry fest. Yep. Great way to bond with the girl.

Christmas eve the kids got to open one present. They were pajamas all around. Tracy was making plans to wake up early on Christmas morning to make her family’s traditional cinnamon rolls. Well, the dough didn’t rise well and when she finally did get them cooked, they were overdone. Presents were good. I don’t think we went overboard. Bennet got his toy vacuum cleaner. Hayden got an erector set. Ellie got a real live sewing machine. Madsen got Zhu Zhu pets. They all received a DVD movie and pillow pets. Tracy got her new camera and I got a few DVDs with Truman G. Madsen. We had finally replaced our stereo of 21 years earlier and we needed to get some new beds, so Tracy and I didn’t get much for each other. For some reason, I got some very B-movie zombie DVDs. That was kind of amusing.

And I never have gotten by the irony of honoring an observant jew’s birth with ham.

The next week was filled with work. On Friday, a day I had asked off, I had to work on a database issue. Working on that prompted a database failure on Saturday, New Year’s day. In anticipating an irate customer, I worked on Sunday to make sure data was available for a report run the following week. Monday, another database alarm prompted me to work again, deleting data and sending a notification. Worked on every day of the holiday.

New year’s eve was pretty nice. We had cheese fondue with bread, broccoli, carrots and sausages. After that we had chocolate fondue with bananas, strawberries, cookies and marshmallows. So we were full and all sugared up. Ellie and Hayden actually made it to midnight. Ellie was pretty punchy though. She had never stayed up that late before.

For a final push of the holidays, Gina babysat the kids and Tracy and I went out and bought some “practice fish” for the kids. Not sure if they will last all that long, but it will be an interesting experiment. Hayden has taken good care of our parakeet, so I’m hoping that will translate to the other kids. Actually, it has been so long since Tracy and I have done much without kids in tow, it is odd to be without them, and we find it difficult to make up our minds in what to do. I wonder if that is what empty-nesters experience.

One other thing that happened is a little conference with Tracy. We need to get the kids reading more. So, I went downstairs and took down the boxes of books that I’ve been keeping since I was young. I kept them for my kids, and that time has finally arrived. I kept some really good books. I hope Hayden can get interested in them.