Digital to Life

Awesome juggling

2010-08-12T21:37:00.000-07:00

Just wanted to share some awesome juggling footage I found. I wish I could juggle half as well as this person.

At it Again

2010-08-09T19:26:00.000-07:00

I was at it again last Friday, juggling in another parade. This time it was the Midvale city parade for Midvale's Harvest Days' celebration.

Once again I was with my friend Lee Brinton, who's running for the Utah Senate District 3 position. The only problem was that I gave the camera to the campaign guy so the only pictures were of Lee: so no video of my juggling this time. On the plus side though, I had much less drops and apparently more people recognized me.

If you want to find out more about Lee then you can check out his homepage or his Facebook page.

Fourth of July Fun

2010-07-04T17:29:00.000-07:00

Juggling in Murray City's Fourth of July Parade (on the third, go figure)

Sunday Thoughts

2010-07-04T10:43:00.000-07:00

I'm sure I've shared this before, but I saw it again today, and it's still as good as ever.

Name that bug

2010-07-01T20:26:00.000-07:00

Okay, it's time for everyone's favorite game: Name that bug

It showed up today on our compost pile, and stuck around a little while for a photo-op before it burrowed back down into the pile. Does anyone out there know what the heck it is? We think it's some sort of ground beetle (good maybe?) but I'm still having problems finding a good picture to identify it with.

World Juggle Day 2010

2010-06-20T12:35:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was world Juggle Day 2010. So where would be the best place the juggle for such an occasion?

The Moon?

Mars?

Even better, the Chalk Art Fesival, put on by the Utah Foster Care Foundation.

Skip High School?

2010-06-20T10:00:00.000-07:00

I was looking at another blog about home schooling where the author basically asked the question, "can I just use high school home schooling time to send my child to a community college to get an associates degree?" (http://sporschool.blogspot.com/2010/06/homeschooling-question-high-school.html) I started thinking about it and decided: why not skip high school?

I've heard chatter here in Utah about if you get your associates degree while in high school (concurrent enrollment, AP tests, etc) then there are special grants to pay for the rest of a bachelors. So why not approach it the other way and get the associates and just apply those credits to a high school diploma while you're at it? I know there are non-traditional ways to get a high school diploma by getting credits from other sources (GED, night school, etc). For example, a GED isn't a high school diploma, but it can count as so many credits applied to a high school diploma. One of my classes was in High School was taught by someone with a Masters, and we were able to sign up to get college credit for that class (concurrent enrollment). I know it was also possible to take classes at the local community college and have them applied towards the High School diploma.

I did a quick check for the colleges I went to to see about getting in without a high school diploma. Salt Lake Community College (SLCC) says "SLCC is an 'open admission' institution, which means there are no minimum grades and test scores required for admission." (http://www.slcc.edu/enrollmentservices/misc/ApplyAdmissions.asp) Basically you show up, pay a little to take their computer test (math and English skills) and that tells you what level of math and English you start at (SAT and ACT scores apply if they were taken within 2 years of enrollment.) As a side note, I took that test because I started there more than 2 years after high school. I was place in English 101 and Trigonometry. I still think I could have started at Calculus there, but the highest math class their test will place you in is trigonometry.

Utah State University actually has an admissions page for homeschool students: http://www.usu.edu/admissions/homeschool/apply.cfm. You have to have an ACT or SAT score and you have to have a GPA of at least 2.5, but I have no idea how a homeschool student gets a GPA.

So it would seem that it is possible to skip high school and go straight for the Associates degree depending on what college the child goes to and that schools requirements. The questions remain though: at what age can a child be prepared to take English 101, trig, and other classes when you home school them? (This really depends on the home schooling parent) If the child places in lower classes is it worth it to pay college tuition to take those lower classes? Are you close enough to a community college to send a young child there every day (or else how will the child live somewhere outside of home to take classes)? And of course what are the social/phycological challenges of a 15 year old in classes with adults? On the other hand, I had classmates in college that were homeschooled and they did say they felt like the first college classes were easier than they were used to.

Mike Lee and Afghanistan

2010-04-23T18:03:00.000-07:00

Warning: if you can’t tell already, this is a political post. If you’re not interested in politics then don’t read it. As for myself, I’m too interested in who’s trying to be my leaders.

The first ads I’ve heard for Utah’s Senate race are of Bob Bennett attacking Mike Lee for his views on Afghanistan. I haven’t heard or seen any other ads yet. Just this one. The ad claims that Mike Lee "wants to cut and run in Afghanistan ‘As soon as we can,'" and that he "demeans our soldiers service as nothing more than ‘Meals on Wheels.' The ad plays sound bits of Mike Lee saying: "if we’re there for purposes of bringing meals on wheels." The ad also plays a sound bit of Mike Lee saying, "if they have as many thugs there as we have right here in Utah County."

The sound bites start with "if" , but has no "then". Curious.

The Salt Lake Tribune give a nice synopsis of the ad and their opinion here: http://blogs.sltrib.com/utpolitics/index.php?p=14609&more=1&c=1&tb=1&pb=1. It provides the full quotes: if and then, and now I can’t help but note a couple of things.

The full quote that is used for the cut and run remark says, (per the Tribune link above), "We need to keep the government focused on national defense. When we’re engaged in something ostensibly for the purpose of national defense. And what I mean by that is we can’t be overseas subjecting our young men and women to danger if the purpose is simply nation building, if we’re there for purposes of bringing meals on wheels to foreign governments or building self-esteem in foreign governments. That’s not why we’re there. We need to get in, fight, kill off the military targets that present us a clear and present threat to national security and get out. And we need to get out as soon as we can.” (Italics added)

Notes: "We need to keep the government focused on national defense." True. That’s why we have a "department of defense," and it’s not called a "department of war" like it used to be. The quote doesn’t look to me like "cut an run" but rather more along the lines of lets do our job and not dilly dally. You can see why he's worried being engaged "ostensibly" or just for looks from the quote below.

The thug quote in the ad is what really got me. The full quote is, "I'm concerned with reports that I am hearing from Afghanistan in particular that we may have 100 or fewer active militant Taliban in Afghanistan. I don’t have any opportunity to verify if that’s true. I don’t get the same security briefing as the president. But if that is true, I ask the question: what on earth are we doing subjecting our brave men and women who need to be supported to that kind of danger, day in and day out, if they have as many thugs there as we have right here in Utah county?”

The Tribune disregards this as "simply wrong," but there are still some things to note. 1: Mike Lee admits he doesn’t know, because he doesn’t get briefed like the president, but he worries about what he does hear (100- enemies). (I'd be worried too.) The Tribune acts like he should know and points to a document about it (http://www.fas.org/sgp/crs/row/RL30588.pdf), but it’s a 94 page document. (By the way, it’s 20,000 Taliban fighters per the above link) Should Mike Lee know that at this point?

Note 2: How many thugs are there in Utah County? I know they don’t have road side bombs and suicide bombers, but I know that they have a lot of crime that’s very well hidden. I don’t even know how to compare the two. I tried, but I couldn’t. Still though, I can see Mike's concern.

I don’t know who to support at this point, but the ad does worry me. I do know that it couldn’t just be taken at face value.

Got a Garden

2010-03-27T22:05:00.001-07:00

Today we finally got a garden in; a task that's been two and a half years in the making. When we first bought this house, the area that has become the garden was a mess. This is what the area looked like. Look a the laundry line buried in the middle.

Clearing out the area is what took most of the time. By last fall we had it mostly cleared out as you can see in the picture below. The laundry line in this picture is the same one as before, but painted. You can get a feel of how many trees there were because they're still in the picture, only in the form of a pile of shredded wood chips.

After that picture was take we cut down a tree, and the branches wound up in the same area. This spring we cleared out the branches ... again. Today I finally was able to put in some garden boxes.

I built two 4'x4' boxes for square foot gardening and an octagon that's about 5' wide for rose bushes. First I built each box taller than I wanted. Then each box was buried it in the ground to keep roots from getting into, or out of the box. Finally they boxes got soil. You can see the three stages below.

We also planted some cold weather crops in one box, and I'll post those pictures soon.

Are you a victory canner?

2010-03-22T19:53:00.001-07:00

It's that time of the year again. Time to start planning and starting the gardens. Once again I'm going to try a canning garden, only this time I'm going for pasta sauce rather than salsa. (Well, maybe salsa too) :)

So I was searching for canning recipes, and I came across this website showing several posters from WWII to encourage home gardens and canning.

http://www.nal.usda.gov/fnic/history/can.htm
It makes me wonder though, would they be promoting the thriftiness of it if they hadn't just come out of the great depression?

This blog has moved

2010-03-19T07:17:00.001-07:00

Well, blogspot made me move my blog, so if anyone is still taking the agonizing pain of reading it still, here's the new address:

This blog is now located at http://kabaju.blogspot.com/.
You will be automatically redirected in 30 seconds, or you may click here.

For feed subscribers, please update your feed subscriptions to
http://kabaju.blogspot.com/feeds/posts/default.

Misc Thougts

2010-02-14T21:26:00.000-08:00

If you want to know what makes marriages work and what makes them fail, don't go to John Gray, he just makes stuff up. Look up John Gottman he has done countless studies in couples and their interactions with each other. Two separate people have told me this now. One has a PhD in the area of psychology and human development and teaches foster care classes in Utah. The other is a professor and family life specialist for the University of Arkansas.

It turns out that when a couple fight and start to become corrosive, they follow a very predictable path. But when they support each other, then they build each other up in a very creative way and it's impossible to predict what they will do next.

Create

2009-11-09T23:41:00.000-08:00

It's late at night (or early in the morning) and I can't sleep. It was good to see this:

Today I got another notice saying that I hadn't gotten a job. I guess the hardest thing for me is that I want to create for someone, and I'm just looking for where to do it. It's nice to get that reminder that I can still create anyway

Pinwheel

2009-10-22T14:55:00.000-07:00

I've been playing around with OpenGL lately, and I decided to share my first program. No, sorry, it's not 'hello world'. It's a simple program that shows a pinwheel blowing in the wind. Next up: GNU Juggle. Okay, not really; maybe sometime in the future. I do have some other plans that I'll be working on soon that my fellow EE geeks should find helpful.

The attachment contains the program to run (windows program) as well as source code for anyone that wants to mess around with it.

Pinwheel.zip

Brainersize

2009-10-18T12:37:00.000-07:00

The other day when I was talking with Ecologista she told me something that really struck me. Way back before writing was invented, and all of the histories were orally passed down from father to son (and mother to daughter), people had much better memories. They had to to in order to preserve their histories. Since we don't have to memorize all those things today, our memories don't work as well. That would explain why I'm so terrible with names. When I was a kid I memorized several scriptures (because I had too) but lately I just haven't memorized anything.

There has been a lot of talk about how fat Americans are getting. Technology is making our lives so much easier that we don't naturally work out our bodies, and all the leftover energy is just working out our bellies. We need to go out of our way to exercise the body. It would seem that thanks to technology our brains are also getting fat and lazy, and we need to go out of the way to exercise the brain, or brainersize. I have a feeling that just as exercise has two fundamental parts: cardio and resistance training, brainersize has two analogous parts: reading and memorizing.

Fortunately I have been doing a lot of reading lately. So far I've read the following books this year (some were audio books):

The Total Money Makeover by Dave Ramsey
Financial Peace Revisited by Dave Ramsey
The Millionaire Next Door by Thomas Stanley
The Five Secrets a Millionaire Taught Me for Women by Richard Paul Evans
Who Moved My Cheese by Spencer Johnson
The Chronicles of Narnia by CS Lewis
Tribes by Seth Godin

I'm also in the middle of reading:

48 Days to the Work You Love by Dan Miller
Thou Shall Prosper by Rabbi Daniel Lapin

And I have a list of a few scriptures that I'm going to start memorizing.

Layoff

2009-09-23T05:26:00.000-07:00

Can anyone be happy about being layed off?

Monday morning at work we all got an e-mail about a meeting Tuesday morning with one of the big wigs from out of town. Work has been slow, so there was a lot of fear about what was going to happen in that meeting. I was doing my best to be optimistic, thinking, "What's the worst that could happen, they fire us? It's probably just them saying that we're still in a terrible recession and so we can't afford raises again (even though they can afford to buy another company)." Of course I knew that they could fire us, but I didn't think it would happen. Tuesday morning, about fifteen minutes before the meeting, my boss called me and another coworker aside. We went to one of the meeting rooms with another boss and someone from HR. In that meeting my boss told us that the company was downsizing and the two of us were being let go effective immediately. Shocked? Yeah. Surprised? Not really.

The thing is, lately I've been reading a lot of books on business. One of the books is "Who Moved My Cheese?" by Spencer Johnson. It's a book I'd recommend to anyone (especially the big boss from out of town.) The book is a fable on dealing with change. In the story there are four characters in a maze looking for cheese; which they find and enjoy for a long time. One day the cheese is gone. Two of the characters just go off looking for more cheese, but the other two sit and complain about how their cheese has been moved. Finally one of those two realizes that fear is holding them back and just sitting around isn't making the cheese come back. So he heads out into the maze again looking for cheese. During the search he realizes that he shouldn't have been surprised that cheese disappeared because it was getting old and stale and the supply was shrinking anyway. As he looks for new cheese he learns new things, and eventually he finds a new supply of cheese (although long after the first two found it.) As for the last character, the one that never moved, well he never moved and in the end he was just a memory.

After I was told that I was let go, the person from HR proceeded to tell me about the severance package (small, but helpful) and that the company had contracted another company to help us find a new job. My head was spinning, but I found myself actually holding back a smile. I cleared out my desk and went to meet the person that was to help me find a new job.

After I left work, I went to a park where I could think. I thought about how at work lately I could see that my cheese was getting old and stale. I was already job hunting, but I didn't want to let my job hunt get in the way of being a good employee, or responsibilities at home, so I wasn't putting a lot of effort into it. Suddenly I have lots of time to job hunt, and I no longer have any reason to be covert about it. I can go up to Logan for that job fair I've been wanting to go to. I can openly ask for references. As I walked through the park, I get more and more excited. I get to look for new cheese. I get to find different kinds of cheese and try them out. Was I happy about losing my job? Yes. I have nothing against my old employer, but it was time to move on and there's no denying it now.

The rest of the day other emotions came in too. I had to think about finances. I started to fear. I don't know how long it will take to find a new job? I've been working to keep those fears in check, but that does take work. I keep telling myself that now it's sink or swim, and sinking isn't an option. I'm still optimistic and excited to find some new cheese.

Fear

2009-08-17T20:10:00.000-07:00

I've been reading the book, "Tribes" by Seth Godin, and I starting thinking about what how he describes "the factory." If you've seen "The Incredibles," then you've seen the perfect example of what Seth is talking about. Early in the movie, you see Bob Parr working at his desk when the boss calls him in. Bob goes into the bosses office where the boss starts rambling about cogs in a clock. All that the boss cares about is maintaining the status quo, and maintaining the bureaucracy. While in the office Bob see's someone getting robbed. He wants to go help, but is held back. Why? At first you may think that it's the boss that's stopping him. The real reason is fear. Bob is afraid of lossing his job (even though he hates it.) He's afraid of being seen. He's afraid, but the only thing that leads to is anger and more trouble.

I've been reading other books that talk about how fear holds us back. As I've been doing this, I've been motivated. That motivation has been drowning fear. Fear of change. Fear of taking a risk. It's all beening pushed out by motivation. It's an amazing thing, this motivation. It makes me feel better, and gain more self worth. Hopefully it's also leading to a lot of growth.

Fear paralyzes
Hope enables

Rule of Thirds

2009-07-22T06:00:00.000-07:00

As we've been going through the pictures from Reds Canyon, some that we took and some that others took of us. We saw that some pictures were composed well, and others were just point and shoot pictures. In the well composed pictures, I kept noticing how much the rule of thirds helped. (Or how much it was needed in the point and shoot pictures.) The rule of thirds is one of the most basic rules in photography to help you get great pictures.

Here's how the rule works. In your mind, take the picture and draw two vertical lines that divide the frame into thirds. Draw two horizontal lines that also divide the picture in thirds. The result is something like this:

As you can see, this creates 4 intersections. Instead of putting the subject, say someone's head, in the middle, try putting it in one of the intersections. Also, instead of putting the horizon in the middle, put it on one of the lines.

Here's a couple examples of how the rule of thirds helps. In the first picture the horizon goes right through the center of the picture. The result is so-so.

In the second picture, the horizon is up higher and it improves the picture. Also a specific subject was added that filled the frame.

In the next example, we were driving near a ridge, and some of the larger rocks had fallen. This created quite the dramatic scene. However this picture failed to fully capture the drama of it all. Notice again how the horizon goes right through the picture

Once we re-frame the picture and take another angle, the picture is dramatically improved.

So next time you decide to go out and take some pictures, remember to take some time and frame the picture, and don't forget the rule of thirds.

Showing off Nature

2009-07-18T06:00:00.000-07:00

More pictures of our trip around the San Rafael Swell.

First: Three sisters showing off the mountain near Temple Mountain.

Second: The sisters showing off the ground near Temple Mountain.

Wasps

2009-07-15T06:00:00.000-07:00

A while ago, I was taking care of something in the garage, and I noticed a wasp nest that I had never seen before. Now normally I would just spay it myself, but because of other things I decided to call some pesticide people to spray it for me. The guy came over and I showed him that nest as well as other places where the wasps like to build their nests. He sprayed all around the garage and all around the house. A week later I went outside and found this nest on one of the basement windows.

It's the same kind of nest that made me call the pest people in the first place, only much bigger. I'm guessing that this one is about six inches in diameter. This means war. I had the guy come out and spray again, and I also bought a wasp trap and hung it up in the back yard. Within a day the trap had already caught some buggers.

No no one has been stun yet. (Except maybe the pesticide dude, the second time he came it was in the middle of the afternoon. And that is the worst time to spray, it's when the wasps are most active.) Still, I want these gone. If anyone has any hints, I'd be happy to take them. As far as I can tell searching on the internet, this nest is for a bald faced hornet. However, even though the trap I caught is supposed to be for hornets, I don't think that's what I've caught. As far as I can tell, these are yellow jackets. Maybe there's some bug experts out there that can shed some light on the subject.

???

2009-07-11T14:55:00.000-07:00

It's amazing what you'll find out in the middle of nowhere.

It's out in Reds canyon in the San Rafael Swell if anyone wants to go fix it up, although that engine will be a beast to rebuild.

Goblin Valley

2009-07-08T20:05:00.000-07:00

Well, we're back from Goblin Valley UT, and there's quite a few pictures from the area that I'll be sharing for a while.

The three sisters of goblin valley are close to the entrance. I guess you could say that they're standing guard ... for something.

Once you get in the park, it's quite impressive the scale of everything. When we first got there, I kept thinking that it reminds me of something. It's like I'd seen it before ... somewhere. Then it hit me: I know why this looks familiar.

This is where you go when you break your ship's Berillium Sphere. I was going to go look for them, but we just didn't have the time for it. Maybe next time.

Yard plans

2009-07-04T06:00:00.000-07:00

A few weeks ago, Ecologista was given the the assignment in her class to be a consultant, and a report to consult a client on the topic of her choise. So we decided to become water wise landscaping consultants, and the client was our own yard; we formed a Xeriscaping plan for our yard. The idea with Xeriscaping is to reduce water used by making watering zones. Some zones have the regular high water usage plants, and other zones are of of low water usage plants. This plan is ambitious and will take a few years to complete, but it will be great when it's done.

Here's our current yard:

Here's the future plans:

Clean Energy Bill?

2009-07-01T17:16:00.000-07:00

The US house recently passed a bill that they called, "American Clean Energy and Security Act." (Bill and Votes). I'm still shocked that this bill passed. Some of the frightening things about this bill is that it is hundreds of pages long, and then the night before it was to be voted on, an amendment was added that was also hundreds of pages long. The US house of representatives voted on this bill before they even had enough time to read it.

Now that may be bad enough (or it may be business as usual for congress) but then I was shocked to hear that Greenpeace opposes the bill. Now that is something frightening: a bill that is supposed to help the environment that Greenpeace opposes. That would be like a bill touted to expand animal rights that PETA opposes. It's like a bill touting to help all news outlets that CNN opposes.

My one hope is that the senate will stop the bill. The bill barely passed the house, and the senate isn't planning on doing anything with it until fall. So at least we have until then to lobby congress to stop it.

Book Review: The Total Money Makeover

2009-06-27T21:36:00.000-07:00

In my last post I talked about the need for a good financial plan, and I mentioned financial plans that just seemed lacking. At the time of that post I had found a great book with a simple, yet powerful plan. That book is, "The Total Money Makeover" by Dave Ramsey. (Amazon or Dave's site.)

There are two great things about this book. The first is that it outlines a simple plan to become debt free and to build wealth. Seven simple steps are outlined:
1) Build a $1000 emergency fund
2) Pay off all debts (except the house) from smallest to largest
3) Build a 3-6 month emergency fund
4) Save 15% of your income for retirement
5) Save for, or fund, college for children
6) Pay off the house early
7) Build wealth and give
(Source)

These are simple steps; nothing new and nothing surprising. What I like about this is the way the steps are put together and are very focused. While Dave outlines these steps, he also addresses common money myths such as the advantages to keeping a large mortgage and explains why these myths are so bad.

The second thing I like about this book is that when you read it, you can't help but be filled with confidence and motivation to complete the process. Dave talks about his own story. He became rich using debt. Then he lost it all and had to file bankruptcy. After the bankruptcy, he built up all of his wealth again using these principles. Dave also has in this book lots of stories from others that have followed this plan, and are now loving life because of it.

After reading this book, I highly recommend it to anyone.

Personal Finance Thoughts: Debt Free

2009-02-15T21:10:00.000-08:00

A while ago I started to get really interested in finance. I remember picking up a book at the library about personal finance, but I put quickly put it aside for a couple of reasons. The first was the author talking about how anyone can get out of debt (after all, she did,) but then the author admitted that she got out of debt by getting lucky and making a lot of money from the housing boom. To me that is the same as saying, "I got out of debt by winning the lottery, and I'll show you how to get out of debt too." Yeah, right, sure. The second reason I didn't like the book was that her definition of debt free was to have no debt except a home mortgage and home equity line of credit. Now I know that it's next to impossible to buy a house without getting a mortgage, but I don't want to have my mortgage for forever. And I definitely don't want to have a second mortgage of any type on my house.

I also get monthly letters from my mortgage broker about finance. Considering the source, it's no surprise that most of the time they are outlining the wealth building power of mortgages with ideas such as: money grows faster in the stock market than a mortgage, if all your money is in the mortgage then it's hard to pull it out when disaster strikes, and you'll lose all your equity in a foreclosure, and so forth. The math is convincing, but isn't it safer to pay off the mortgage as soon as you can? They say it isn't.

On the other hand, I once saw a community education class that said something to the effect of, "learn how to get out of debt completely in six months, including the mortgage. Stop putting money in savings and the 401k/IRA and get out of debt fast." Getting out of debt sounds great, but not having money in savings sounds scary for when disaster strikes. I didn't like the debt models of having as big of a mortgage as possible, but this idea seemed just as bad on the other side. I also couldn't see how someone can pay off a mortgage and all other debts in just six months.

I want a money plan that's in the middle. One that will lead to no debt whatsoever, but still allow for savings for the future. I recently found that plan, but I'll save it for another post (this one is already plenty long.)

Eventful Weekend

2008-03-22T21:12:00.000-07:00

We've had quite the eventful weekend. The in-laws came up Friday and helped us get a lot done. My wife and her sister did a lot of washing the walls. My mother-in-law then patched the walls. My father-in-law primed the walls (and everyone else did primer too). He also helped me put up the sheetrock in the bathroom yesterday, and today the wall got patched together. However the biggest thing that happened was that I was finally able to insulate the crawl-space.

It's been one long weekend, it's a good thing that I have Sunday to rest.

Totally Awesome Governor (Wannabe)

2008-03-19T20:13:00.000-07:00

I couldn't believe the news when I saw it Monday morning, but Dell Schanze is running for Governor of Utah. For those of you who don't know who this is, here's a quick list of accomplishments (and yes I am using that term loosely.)

Opened a computer store chain named "Totally Awesome Computers" which had really weird commercials
Later opened a gun store (Totally Awesome Guns and Ranges) as well as a para shooting store.
Sued the city of Provo because they didn't by his computers
Got lots of media publicity for other stunts such as para gliding onto a freeway
Pulled a gun on neighbors because they approached him about speeding through the neighborhood
Eventually closed and sold all of his businesses less than a year later, although supposedly not because of the gun incident

Naturally my first reaction to him running for mayor was "oh no." But tonight I heard him on the radio talking about the campaign. My reaction now is to just laugh at him. The talk show hosts were trying to help him, but he just kept pushing himself into a pit. The main points are:

He wants fund raising events with things like fireworks, monster trucks, advertising etc.
He wants a minimalist government, but doesn't know how he's going to do that
The only main platform he could come up with is to hire a think tank to come up with ideas. It soon sounded like he wanted to hire others to tell him what to do.

All I can do is laugh at him. And now the moral of the story: if you want to run for office, main priorities should probably be to have an idea of what you want to do first. It might help too to build a favorable public image too. Just a thought.

The power of one

2008-02-29T20:47:00.000-08:00

The other day I was browsing some online comics and I found a really great one:

After reading this I just had to google "Died in a blogging accident" There were about 300,000 results. It turns out that the day this comic was published that phrase became the 6th most searched for term on google.

The thing is that we all hear, "you can make a difference in the world," but how much do you really believe it? This is someone that has made a big difference and the author didn't even have to spend millions of dollars running for president. So I started wondering how such a big change was done with one post. A couple of reasons are:

Consistancy (this comic is consistantly posted)
Simple
Entertaining
And most interestingly enough, most people didn't think that it wasn't that big a thing.

I don't know if the author posted this thinking "How can I mess with google today? Maybe he did, maybe he didn't. Still I'm sure that most people googling the phrase didn't think about how it would mess with google.

On a side note, I just heard this teaser on the radio news: "The police have reported a decrease of reports involving cheese."

What would you do with $800?

2008-02-28T05:16:00.000-08:00

A while ago, when the government was first talking about the stimulus package, the local newspaper here had a front page article: "What would you do with $800?" The package has now passed, and I keep seeing the same idea from this article in lots of places. In short, most americans will receive a check from the IRS in a few month. They have three options with the money:
-spend it
-save it
-pay off debt

The general consensus is that the best thing for one's personal finances would be to pay off debt and save it. However the best thing for the economy would be to spend it.

I argue that the best thing for the economy would be to first pay of debt, and second save the money. Think about it. The main reason for the current downturn of the economy is that people spent too much money on houses and credit cards, and now people are defaulting on those accounts and financial corporations are posting huge losses of money. This in turn is affecting the rest of the economy. The brightest looks at the economy say that the housing/credit crisis will continue to be a problem. So I argue that the best thing to do would be attack those directly, not attack the side effects. So how do we do this? First pay off debt. If we all payed down debt, then there wouldn't be a big of losses, and the economy could start going up again. After that: put the money in the bank. You see, that money in the bank not just a nice fall back, that even pays you back through interest. When the banks have more money then can open up lending again (only be wiser about how they do it. That money goes to large things like buying houses (hey a solution to the housing crisis) and building businesses (wow, creating jobs, feeding money back into the economy.)

So what about spending the money? Well from an economy standpoint, it can create a short term jump in spending that ends in a few weeks. Most likely people will spend more than they get, go deeper in debt, and we're even worse off then before. Compare that to the idea that after the current debt is payed down, people are able to spend more in the long run. Also when people have savings, then the next time there's a downturn, they can turn to savings and live off that. That way the downturn doesn't last as long.

So when you get a rebate check, I beg of you, help the economy and pay off your debt and save it. When others talk about spending it, tell them to help the economy and spend the check on paying off the credit cards. After that, maybe they can buy themselves a present like a shiny new, high yield savings account. It's the gift that keeps on giving (literally.)

2008-02-24T08:59:00.001-08:00

Yesterday we had a little family reunion. We took several pictures, but I think the best ones are these of the little kids. Aren't they so cute.

More House Pictures

2008-02-24T07:58:00.001-08:00

This is what the bathroom has looked like for quite some time now. Hopefully soon here I'll be able to that sheetrock up.

A little soldering work

This is one of the light fixtures we got cheaply. You gotta love the discount bins. You can also see the easy texturing we are doing on the ceilings. So much better than mud.

lights

2008-02-01T15:05:00.000-08:00

I'm excited. The other day we went to a lighting store to get new light fixtures. The store turned out to be quite expensive, but then we found the clearance table. We wound up buying enough lights to replace all of the lights on the main floor, and everything cost only $5 or $6 each. As we were checking out the clerk noted that we did very well (she got to see what the original prices were.) I don't know how much we saved, but I know it was a lot. N0w we just need to finish the ceiling and get the lights up. Then I'll start posting some pictures of that.

Plumbing and soldering

2007-12-30T20:46:00.000-08:00

When we bought this house I wasn't planning on doing any plumbing, but my father-in-law talked me into replacing the old galvanized pipes upstairs as long as we're doing all the other remodeling. So for about a week the water to the house has been off while we tore out all the plumbing to put in new copper pipes. Yesterday we turned the water back on, and amazingly enough it worked. Of course I went through great pains to screw the connectors into the galvanized pipes that still remain in the basement. Also since I have done a lot of soldering with electronics stuff it was easy for me to figure out how to solder the copper pipes together.

As far as I can tell soldering pipes is very similar to soldering in electronics. The two main things to remember are: flux is your friend and use lots of heat. Here's how I did it.

To start off with I just soldered a connector to a pipe. That way I could easily inspect both where I was putting the solder as well as inside the connector at the opposite end of the solder joint. To start off with the copper needs to be cleaned. You can buy a special brush to clean out the inside of the copper, but instead I just used the green scrubbing pad on a regular sponge for washing dishes. Rub where the copper connects to make it shiny. Then you put on the flux. I got the best connections when I put the flux on the outside of the pipe as well as the inside of the connector. Remember that the flux helps the solder flow and that's why you need a lot. When I did use a lot of flux then I could see the solder not only went all the way around the outside of the connection, but the flux helped it wick into the joint. Now I know that those are very strong joints. The pipes themselves will break before those joints leak. The other thing to remember is to use lots of heat. If you don't use enough heat then the solder won't flow, it just balls up. The same is true with electronics, but there you need to take some care to not heat it up too much or you'll damage the circuitry. With the pipes you don't really need to worry about this. So use lots of heat. (Just don't burn down the house:)

Christmas Eve

2007-12-24T21:17:00.000-08:00

It's Christmas eve and this is how I feel

http://xkcd.com/361/

I spent basically all day working on the house. When I wasn't at the house I was getting supplies (borrowing power tools, getting plumbing stuff, and so forth.) Now it's probably time to go to bed. So instead I'm on the internet looking at supplies and calculating how I'm going to change the kitchen sink area so that we can install a dishwasher in the near future. At least if I stay up until 3am it won't be on the computer (I hope.)

As I side note, I just love this comic. The artist can draw very well, but for some reason he draws the main characters as stick figures. Then you have the irony of whenever there is actually good artistry (even better than this one) and the characters are still stick figures.

Also if you decide to follow this comic, be warned. Not all of them are the cleanest. I just avoid those ones.

The outside of the house

2007-12-24T20:55:00.001-08:00

I know what you are wondering. Why in the world haven't I posted a picture of the house itself especially since this picture clearly isn't new (there is currently no grass in sight, and not even a driveway in sight.) Well I had to do some special modifications to the picture before I uploaded it. Can't be giving away secret information after all.

Ceramics room

2007-12-23T08:16:00.001-08:00

One of the oddities of this house is the ceramics room. We bought the house from an old man who had basically inherited it from his parents. In the past his mom had done ceramics. Now we have a room full of ceramics and ceramic molds. There was a kiln in garage, but that vanished in the space between when the seller moved the assisted living and we closed on the house. (Just like many other things. Darned greedy family that wouldn't help him move.)

Now I just need access to another kiln.

Working on the house

2007-12-16T09:50:00.000-08:00

Difficulties getting time with high speed internet continue (or any internet for that matter.) At least I can post this now. This is what I wanted to post last week.

When we bought the house, it was in a major mess. Dirty, full of junk, and with lots of fixer upper work to do. In a couple of places the carpet was so worn that you could see the floor underneath it. Amazingly enough though that was one of the nice things about it. What you'd see is a spot of hardwood floor. Last weekend and this weekend we worked on pulling up the carpet. Here is basically our first view of the hardwood floor without carpet covering it up.

(as you can imagine, it's a dusty in there.)

The anouncement

2007-12-08T21:51:00.000-08:00

Well I mentioned this in my first post, so I might as well give the announcement here. Of course if you're reading this blog then chances are you're you're among my family and friends and you already know about it. If not then I don't know who you are or what you're doing reading my blog, but that's okay. I'll tell you anyway.

We bought a house!!

We actually closed on it a couple of weeks ago, and because of it life has gotten a lot more hectic. We had to move out of the apartment and in with some family so we can fix up the house and not wind up paying double rent. Also we bought it from an old man and we bought it "as is" so we need to take a lot of time to clean out his stuff. I'd post more but unfortunately the family we're staying with doesn't have high speed internet and I haven't had much time for the internet outside work anyway. I do hope to post about once a week to tell about the more exiting stuff with the house (you know just about anything besides, "we filled up the trash with more junk.") Monday I'll post what we did today. I'd say now, but I'll wait until I can upload a picture at work. It's one of those things where words just aren't enough. You have to see pictures.

Funny Math

2007-11-16T22:12:00.001-08:00

Sorry I found this after the last post, and I couldn't help but mention it.

On the main website for "Who Killed the Electric Car" (http://www.sonyclassics.com/whokilledtheelectriccar/electric.html) they list some "facts":

Fact 8: "The United States consumes almost 9 millions barrels of gasoline daily ..."
Fact 9: "If everyone purchased on of the four most efficient models in each vehicle class, fuel economy would be 12% higher and Americans could save 13.1 billion gallons of gasoline annually"

So lets add those up. Everyone buys a nice car, and together we save 13.1 billion gallons of gas, or 13,100 million gallons of gas every year.

Daily that would be a reduction of 13,100/365 or 35.9 million. How can we save 35.9 million daily if we're only spending 9 million daily?

Green Cars

2007-11-16T21:26:00.000-08:00

Interesting to look at the stories of green cars, the cars that are supposed to reduce our carbon footprint.

Last year Sony Pictures came out with the movie, "Who Killed the Electric Car," which talks about the short life of GM's EVO. I never saw the movie, just the trailer. Now I have a bachelors in electrical engineering, so when I saw the trailer several things popped out at me. For example they say the electric car "produced no exhaust." The statement is misleading because the car doesn't produce exhaust when running, but exhaust is created when the electricity is produced to run it. Also they say the electric car isn't for everyone, "it can only meet the needs of 90% of the population." Now the EVO was expensive, and could only be used as a commuter car (the charge only lasted about the length of an average commute, then it took about 8 hours to recharge.) My guess is that the only people that can really afford the car, are about the 10% that it doesn't fit.

I had forgotten about the movie until today.

In the trailer someone says, "in the last fifteen years they've been saying fuel cells are ten to fifteen years off." But on November 15th Honda announced the, "FCX Clarity Advanced Fuel Cell Vehicle" which is to be sold mid next year. I learned about this watching TV a day or two ago and saw a commercial for it. My reaction was to say out loud, "What! They finally came out with a fuel cell car?!" So today I decided to look it up. http://world.honda.com/FuelCell

On the website they explain a few things, like the fuel is Hydrogen and the only emission is H2O (water.) They acknowledge that CO2 is created when getting Hydrogen, but that process generally creates less CO2 than a normal car. They're even have a station for you to make your own hydrogen at home using the natural gas line. The station will even make electricity and heat for your home. The specs are quite impressive.

Of course as an engineer, there are still several questions I'd like answered. What does this cost? You know the car is expensive, and the station is even more expensive. What about the batteries? Honda's new car has lithium ion batteries. They are compact, hold a lot of power, and highly explosive. For some reason neither Honda or the movie trailer mentioned that last one. Trust me, if an EVO got into a major accident, the batteries would make it much worse.

So in the end we are left with interesting new gadgets, but unfortunately we'll have to put up with the mundane for now.

Blogging It

2007-11-11T20:01:00.000-08:00

Well I keep reading other peoples blogs like family and friends so I decided I might as well start my own. I always have rants in my head that I'd like to get out and now I can. And if some reader doesn't like it, then I don't care. They're the ones that decided to read it. It's not like I'm going to force anyone to read these.

Also there are some things that are going to go on soon that I want to be able to share with others. I can't say what they are yet, but hopefully I can in a week or two. So keep your eye's peeled (especially if you're family.)