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