Paul's Vortex

New Years Resolutions

2011-12-30T11:34:00.002-06:00

OK so I still have 2 days left...but I'm writing out my 2012 goals and thought it a good time to review where I got in 2011.

Admittedly, I'm taking a pass on some from last year because my decision to go to grad school drastically changed where my time and energy went to. And grad school had been a vague goal I've had for a long time, so I think I'll just count that as an "extra". Still...I actually got 6 out of 10 this year

I decided this year I'm going to write these out differently though. Rather than set 10 knowing I probably will get 5, I think I'm going to set 2-3 goals that are more of the "stretch" kind, and then the rest, however many that is, either ongoing goals or more todo/bucket list things.

This year - I want to get an "A" on my final Capstone project for grad school, and start (continue? from 7th grade) piano lessons. I still have some logistics to figure out on the second one, I think I need a teacher that is more geared toward adults, which might be tricky. Todos? Look into solar panels - we've been wanting to look at that for awhile. Refinish that little table that sits downstairs that I've meant to do for 14 years (and even got halfway done once). And get to visit some more people this year - after school is done in August probably.

Happy New Year...in two days!

Homer's Odyssey

2011-12-30T11:19:00.004-06:00

I got Gwen Cooper's recent book "Homer's Odyssey" for Christmas from my mom, and finished it this morning. I was in tears at Chapter 23 - what a fantastic (true) story! I'd recommend it to anyone who is a pet owner/cat lover.

Gwen's blog is here:

http://gwencooper.com/wordpress/

Little Tom

2011-12-19T16:48:00.000-06:00

I can't help but share these...Thanks to the Camp Companion FB page for sharing this one.

http://animalcaresociety.wordpress.com/2011/12/18/little-tom/

BTW, if you're on Facebook and you're an animal person, you should subscribe to Camp Companion's FB page - I am continually amazed by how many animals that group takes care of and adopts with such little resources (but lots of volunteer energy!)

Smart Phone Addiction?

2011-11-28T11:36:00.001-06:00

Thanks to friend Bill for this one:

http://www.cioinsight.com/c/a/IT-Management/Smartphone-Addiction-Nine-Telltale-Signs-660974/?kc=EWWHNEMNL11282011STR2

If I have to be completely honest (and I adjust "watching my kid's soccer game" to "watching a sporting event") I would have to own up to 5 out of 10. Smart phones are great pieces of technology but like anything, they can get overused :(

Happy Halloween!

2011-10-31T19:32:00.003-05:00

We just finished handing out all our candy, 7:26pm, 350 pieces (we gave some kids two of the smaller pieces). Last year it was closer to 8...quite a few, and still a lot walking by.

And, I am proud to say that I didn't eat a single piece. One of the advantages of having so many kids so quickly :) I DID enjoy a nice big piece of maple bacon wedding cake this weekend at the wedding we were at (all the food was fantastic actually). The cake was as good as it sounds!

It Gets Better Project - Republicans

2011-10-27T10:03:00.000-05:00

I've been following the "It Gets Better" project since it started over a year ago by Dan Savage and others. There are thousands (maybe millions) of It Gets Better videos that have been made by gay people, advocates, companies, and I'm glad to say even many professional sports teams now have added videos. The Advocate published an article yesterday with a link to an It Gets Better video made by all of the senators and representatives from New Jersey - ALL of them, including the 3 Republicans. I commend them for putting aside political differences and addressing need for change with the problems of kids getting bullied and feeling the need to commit suicide.

Dear Me...

2011-10-20T10:53:00.002-05:00

One of my dear friends recently posted a blog entry about an article about celebrities writing letters to their younger selves - cleverly titled Dear Me. Our diversity groups at work have had similar exercises, the results of which people within the group have shared.

I've done this exercise in my head many times. Maybe I have watched and read too much sci-fi and have "seen" the bad things that can happen because of messing with the timeline, but I always end up on the skeptical side of making changes. ("Back to the Future" is probably the most widely known example. If you're more geeky, Star Trek: The Next Generation had an episode called "Parallels" which discussed alternate realities. Star Trek: Voyager had several episodes dealing with time travel and the "temporal prime directive" and how bad things can get when you mess with time).

In any case, it's always been very hard for me to come up with things I would actually tell my younger self, for fear that I would actually make things turn out worse somehow. Maybe that is a testament to how well I think my life has turned out (?), maybe I haven't made too many major mistakes (?). I always come up with about 2 or 3 very specific things I'd probably like to undo (I won't share these :) But I also think I might encourage my younger self to not be so afraid to do things - almost every regret I come up with is usually something I DIDN'T do.

My friend and I also agreed that maybe the point of the exercise is to make sure you learn from your mistakes (since you can't actually go tell your younger self stuff).

vs.

2011-10-20T10:33:00.000-05:00

WARNING: rant ahead.

I have a set of geek podcasts I listen to, one of them being NPR's "Science Friday". They're pretty hit and miss, some are fluff and some are really interesting, depends on the speaker usually.

Anyway, the one I listened to yesterday was about "denialism" of science in our society. Basically, the group of science-oriented people who think that people who ignore science because of some other belief (religion, morality, or just plain ignorance) are stupid and wrong. Just like people who perceive science conflicting with their religious or moral beliefs are stupid and wrong.

Now...I'm not defending a "side" here, and in fact I am really tired of the fact that we have "sides" in the first place. In this particular case, the issue is always portrayed as "science vs. religion" or "science vs. morality", as if they are really two comparable things.

Science, to my understanding, and based on definitions I've found, is basically the process of understanding and explaining how things work. How things "are". Conclusions, theories, postulates, etc. in science can be proven or dis-proven, and to me, a good scientist is always in pursuit of the truth, meaning their goal should be to better understand how the world around them works, functions, etc.

Faith, religion, morality, etc. are essentially a set of beliefs a person has about what's right and wrong, or how the world should be, or in an abstract sense, the "why" behind how the world is.

Scientific understandings can certainly be APPLIED - as a factor in creating and inventing new things, making things work better, and making decisions as a society or government on the laws and policies we make.

Beliefs can also be APPLIED in a similar manner - many of society's laws and rules have a moral as well as practical basis (we all agree that people shouldn't kill other people, that we shouldn't steal from each other, etc.)

The problem is when these two things are equated. It is all too easy to look through history and see where a particular religion or belief system "took offense" to a scientific explanation of how something in the world works. When scientists in the middle ages learned that the sun and planets didn't revolve around the earth, they were made to be religious heretics because that threatened a belief that the earth and its people were somehow "divine".

Did the fact that we now understood something that we didn't understand before actually change the scientific reality of anything? No. Did that have to mean that the people's belief that the earth and its people were special or "divine" really have to change? No - in fact it seems like it should never really be a big stretch for someone who believes in a higher power to believe that maybe the higher power knows more than they do (duh).

Likewise, we see scientists who have turned their science into their belief system - that every scientific conclusion should dictate the way we live, and that if we don't "believe" in this science and do as it "instructs" we are wrong. (NOTE I'm not talking about a person choosing to believe there is no higher power or choosing not to have a belief system, which is an individual choice). The examples that came up in this podcast were genetically modified food, and abortion. This guy's argument was that because no one has gotten "significantly ill" because of genetically modified food (a subjective phrase, not a scientific one), that we should all just be ok with it. And that on abortion, if science were to prove that an unborn fetus less than 3 months old couldn't actually feel the abortion procedure being done, that everyone against abortion should rethink their views and be ok with that and that we're stupid and ignorant if we're not. In effect, creating (ironically) a belief system out of science.

The particular abortion discussion that was going on was between this speaker and a caller who was fairly obviously against abortion - but in this case I felt like she was at least making the distinction between science and her beliefs - basically saying that one of the reasons she BELIEVES abortion is wrong is because of scientific evidence that a fetus can feel what's going on.

I guess the frustration I have really is that everything in our society seems to be geared toward A vs. B, yes or no, up-or-down votes, one-word answers, polarization, where in reality issues are complicated and most people are somewhere in the middle. Politicians are the worst on this, and the media feeds into it as well.

"Either you're pro-life or you're pro-choice."
"For genetically modified food or against it."
"For or against gay marriage."
"Democrat or Republican."
"Creation or Evolution."
and my personal favorite "If you're not a Republican then you must be against God."

That's just a short list. If I look those over, I know that on most of them I have more than one opinion and have a whole range of feelings on them, and some can't even be directly compared. The creation vs. evolution example is along the same lines as the earlier mention of "heretics" that thought everything revolved around the earth. Just because we now understand something more about the world (that evolution has gone on and is still going on today), does that preclude the existence of God or a higher power? Of course not - in fact I'd say that a higher power designing a planet would probably want to have designed in the capability of things to evolve and adapt if they wanted it to survive a long time. It isn't a big stretch to think the writers of the bible wrote things in terms they understood AT THE TIME - that doesn't make them wrong, it just means we know more about how our world works now than they did then.

Presbyterian Church, Madison, Wisconsin

2011-10-17T15:43:00.000-05:00

Thanks to my faraway (in Iowa) friend Susan for sharing this one:

http://www.desmoinesregister.com/article/20111016/OPINION01/310160020/1036/Guest-columnist-long-journey-changed-heart

I grew up in a Presbyterian church so this means a little bit more to me. Blessings to Scott Anderson as he re-embarks on his journey as a pastor.

Yes to animal shelter adoption, no to animal breeders

2011-10-14T09:35:00.000-05:00

I recently saw this posted on the Camp Companion Facebook page, and it broke my heart. I encourage everyone to read it, I'll warn you if you have pets of your own you will be in tears (but you should still read it and pass it on).

http://themagnificentsoil.tumblr.com/post/10716076247/a-letter-from-a-shelter-manager-anonymous-in

I realize there are "human" problems like poverty and hunger that we need to deal with and I'm not trying to inflate animal issues. But the problem with the uncontrolled population is one that can be solved. I certainly hope that employees at animal pounds treat the animals there with as much dignity and respect as possible - there is no reason to abuse animals, even if they are going to be put to sleep. However, animal pound employees are not the problem - they do not have the resources to deal with an overpopulation problem that is caused by people buying animals from breeders and then surrendering or abandoning them because "they're too much work" or "they didn't expect this or that".

There is NO need for pet breeders - we have plenty of available pets in this world just waiting for good homes. Even if you want a purebred, an estimated 30% of animals in shelters and rescues are purebreds. And pets need to be spayed and neutered!!! There is no good excuse for not doing this - for people that can't afford to have this done privately at their vet, there are public and private programs all over the place to help with this and many will even do it for free.

The animals that are euthanized at shelters for no good reason don't get a choice. We, as a society, need to step up and solve this very solvable problem that WE have created.

This one deserves a repost...

2011-10-07T11:08:00.000-05:00

Thanks to friend Shelley for sharing this one - I, too, grew up with Mr. Rodgers Neighborhood and believe if we could all be more like Fred Rodgers, this world would be a wonderful place to be.

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2011/09/each-of-you-is-special-just-because.html

It's just "Don't Ask" now...

2011-09-21T09:47:00.000-05:00

Yesterday (9/20) morning at 12:01am, the "Don't Ask, Don't Tell" (DADT) policy that formalized the ban on gay and lesbian persons in the military officially ended. The policy was created in 1993 by then President Clinton as a compromise between the change he wanted to make (to fully allow gays and lesbians to serve openly) and the policy that congress would actually pass and that the miliary at the time would actually accept. Most people forget that, despite DADT not being what anyone wanted at the time, it WAS better than what the military's policy was before (before that, they could ask, pursue, dig into your personal life, etc. - after DADT, they couldn't). Still, 13,000+ qualified men and women have been discharged from the military in 18 years under DADT, simply for being themselves.

Of course it's only been a day, but the general feeling is that this really isn't going to change very much. Sure, there will be a spike of gays and lesbians currently serving to come out over the next few days (this article was a good example, and another talked about two soldiers just got married since they live in a state that allows it) but, just as in most workplaces, people go to work and do their job, and, for the most part, leave their personal life at home.

I had a long chat with a friend of mine who has served in the military about this a few years ago. He thought it would be very disruptive and he would have been uncomfortable serving with a gay soldier. I asked him if he was uncomfortable serving with female members of the military and he said no. I then asked if the military has a code of conduct that everyone is required to follow. He said yes (I already knew that, but I was pointing it out). I said that if ALL soldiers, gay, straight, or otherwise, are required to follow this code of conduct or lose their job, then what difference does it make if they're gay? I think he thought about that one for awhile. We never had another chat about it, so I don't know.

I don't think this is some huge step forward in rights like many people are making it out to be. The vast majority of the military are in their teens and 20s, and that generation of people is already past this issue and doesn't care anyway. Most people growing up now know and have gay and lesbian friends in high school and college. It's still good to know that these qualified men and women will no longer be losing their jobs for no good reason.

Unrelated, I also have to throw in this article I read this morning: http://news.yahoo.com/alexander-gop-leaders-thanks-no-thanks-223425967.html.

It talks about a Tennessee republican senator who has decided he doesn't want to be forced to vote party lines on everything anymore, but rather actually make a conscious decision about each piece of legislation he is voting on. This article shouldn't even be news, EVERY one of our elected leaders should base their decisions on their constituents, the available facts, and their conscience, but in our current system that is NOT the case. So kudos to Senator Lamar Alexander of Tennessee, I hope you get re-elected next fall.

The ABCs of me

2011-09-15T11:26:00.000-05:00

My good friend Shelley in her baking blog did a re-post of this "ABCs of me" which is getting passed along from blog to blog. I generally don't "forward" stuff, but this isn't quite the same as forwarding email, and there's no penalty of death or years of bad luck if you don't continue it on. But if you do have a blog, it's kind of a fun thing to post.

A – Age. I’m 37

B – Bed Size. King

C – Chore I dislike. Cleaning the bathroom. I can never seem to get the nooks and crannies, and I've never been good with cleaning chemicals. Vaccum, dust, sweep, fold clothes, love it! (maybe I don't like the "wet" cleaning chores?)

D – Dogs. I love animals and someday we'll have a dog. But I'd have to say I'm really a cat person at heart when it comes down to it.

E – Essential start to my day. A good breakfast, coffee, and I do a lot better when I get that half hour of "quiet time" in the morning - I relish it.

F – Favorite Colors. Earth tones.

G – Gold or silver? Gold (do I really have a strong preference? no)

H – Height. I’m 5’10.5"

I – Instruments I play(ed). I took piano lessons for a number of years when I was younger. I have played saxophone since the 6th grade (26 years now!). Same with handbells. I attempted trumpet lessons two years ago and failed miserably, but it was fun. I

J – Job title. Advisory Software Engineer

K – Kids. Three wonderful little kittehs.

L – Live. Rochester MN, for 14 years.

M - Money tip I like best. I like the one Shelley posted (spend less than you make) but I might take that a step further and say "be happy with what you have". Sometimes we forget to do that.

N – Never plan to… Control everything :)

O – Overnight hospital stays. Tonsils out when I was 7. The sinus surgery I had at age 15 was almost going to turn into an overnight but made it out before the day was over :)

P - Pet Peeves. People who think they need to fill up all quiet spaces with talking, or feel the need to chime in on absolutely every topic being discussed. Intolerance of other people's beliefs and cultures, period. People who claim to be Christians but demonstrate hatred and fear by their actions.

Q - Quote from a movie. The entire end speech that Michael Douglas makes in "The American President". My friend Tony and I had that all memorized at one point. "My Name is Andrew Sheppard and I AM the president."

R – Righty or lefty? Righty, but I still suspect I might bat left handed - or maybe I just suck at softball :)

S - Siblings. I have a younger sister 3 years younger, and a younger half-brother who is 25 years younger.

T - Time I wake up. I only wish I could sleep past 7...usually it's 6 or sometimes even earlier.

U – Underwear. Boxer briefs.

V - Vegetables I don’t like. Cauliflower. Plain celery. There are probably others.

W – What makes me run late. Usually just stupidity - I don't tend to be late much though.

X – X-rays I’ve had. Besides the regular dental checkups, broken arm in 3rd grade, broken finger in college, and broken wrist last year.

Y – Yummy food I make. The family recipe, handed down from my grandma, for chocolate chip cookies. Everyone loves these. I don't say that lightly - really, everyone does.

Z – Zoo animals I like. Elephants.

Kitteh

2011-09-14T21:53:00.000-05:00

Today marks 3 years with Madame Sparkles and Mr. Fluffy Face. I'm including the most recent picture of each - Madame in her very common stately pose, and Fluffy Face in one of his new favorite hiding spots, the top shelf of our bedroom closet.

Better Choices

2011-09-13T14:48:00.000-05:00

I just entered week 27 of my food "lifestyle change" (I have been reminded that "diet" is just "die" with a "t" and what I'm doing isn't hard and is a permanent commitment). I'm down 33 lbs and have 10 to go for my initial goal.

I didn't lose any weight over the past two weeks. And I didn't gain any either. And this is a good thing. Here's why - both last weekend and the weekend before I was out of town, somewhat on vacation, and away from my "safety" zone of good eating. Now I've explained that part of making a permanent change like this is realizing that in times like vacations, you do need to enjoy yourself and not miss out on certain things just to stay on some strict eating schedule. However, part of that is also learning how to make "better" choices even when you're out of your regular schedule, and realize that you may even put on a pound or two during those times, but then get back to normal, and that's ok. That is a situation I need to be able to handle and repeat for the rest of my life.

Did I do ok over those weekends? Yeah. Most of the meals had fruit and vegetables and proteins, and I was able to choose those over carbs. I "pre-approved" the night I knew we were going out to the pizza restaurant, as that is what we were doing, it was a new and unique place, and I knew I would enjoy it. And I did. And the past weekend, when we were at the sports bar watching the Nebraska game, most of the food was bar food and the choices were somewhat limited (I still did as good as I could, broccoli-cheese soup and chicken fingers vs. french fries and nachos).

Could I have done better? Yeah. At the lake, we had two big boxes of homemade chocolate chip cookies, one box that they made and one that I made. When we got to the lake after the 6 hour drive, I wanted a cookie. Fine, one cookie after a long drive on a vacation is fine. Within 2 hours I'd had 10. Not fine. And over the weekend, I probably had 10 more. Not fine. I can do better than that. 20 cookies in a weekend is like my old days. And, to quote a famous Jedi Master, "that leads to the dark side".

So...the process continues. But I feel pretty good about 2 weekends in a row where I was able to maintain my current weight, and then jump right back into the "normalcy" of my good eating decisions.

In the Zone

2011-08-19T19:39:00.000-05:00

It's a beautiful summer day in Minnesota, I hope everyone here had the chance to just sit outside and get a little bit of sun (and yes, we all freak out too much about sunburns and skin cancer - getting 15 minutes of good solid sunlight without sunscreen is still good for us - Vitamin D - as well as just puts us in a better mood!)

Sports athletes talk about being "in the zone" when they're on a hitting streak, shooting streak, etc. - some even describe feeling like everything seems like everything around them is in slower motion and they are at full speed. I don't know if I would exactly describe all of that for me, but I'm heading into my last week of my first of 4 semesters of graduate school (yes, I'll be 1/4 done on Thursday!), am handling the constant busy-ness at work, and am continuing to lose weight, and mostly just feel great. Yeah, sometimes I feel tired, but usually it's a good kind of tired :)

I was chatting with my manager this morning and told him how good I felt lately and how much I was getting done despite all the things going on, and he said he once heard the quite "If you want something done, give it to a busy person". Why is this so true? I know in college I performed a lot better with the 18-credit semesters than with the 12-credit ones. The summer job I had in Omaha, I got WAY more work done in our busy times than in our non-busy times. And in earlier years in Rochester, I was involved in a LOT of activities (probably more than I should have been) and yet I maintained a much more regular exercise and workout routine than I did the last couple of years, even though I was much busier.

So...I guess maybe my very good friend from college hit it on the money with the phrase he always used: "I'll sleep when I'm dead". Words to live by :)

192

2011-08-14T13:08:00.000-05:00

Happy Mid-August to everyone! For those of us in Minnesota, I hope you are all enjoying the nicer summer weather we've had this week.

Today is the end of week 22 of my Atkins diet, and I weighted in at 192 this morning, which is a total lost of 31 lbs. The past month was not a huge amount of "loss" because of a 5-day vacation in Maine (and who isn't going to eat great food on vacation, not to mention great seafood in Maine!) but even with that trip, it's still going pretty well (over 1 lb/week average). Yesterday was particularly fun because we went and did some clothes shopping, and I bought 3 new pairs of skinnier jeans (not to be confused with "skinny fit" jeans as my build is not designed to wear those no matter how much weight I lose!). Just to give you some perspective, last winter (before I started this) I finally had to break down and buy two pairs of jeans and a pair of black pants in bigger sizes because I couldn't fit into the clothes I had anymore. The jeans I bought yesterday are 4 sizes smaller than those, and still actually had some breathing room. I'm going to give my larger-sized clothes to charity this week so that I don't have anything to fall back on (not that I have any intention or thought that I'm ever going to slip to that level again). My goal is still 180 by the end of the year - even if I go at the 1 lb/week pace, that is still easily doable (and if I don't quite make it, no big deal, I WILL make it by next year!).

I'm also entering my final two weeks of summer semester for grad school - it's hard to believe that I'm already done with 2 1/2 months of this 14-month program, it's going fast! I get a WHOLE WEEK off between summer and fall, at which point both Erin and I will be in classes, so you may not see us much in the fall (hopefully we'll get a few breaks!) My fall semester looks to be pretty full, as I'll not only be taking the 8 credits of the program classes, but a 3-credit elective. Eleven credits plus work, plus activities...well it's going to be full. But I'm looking forward to it.

Back to studying...

Retired

2011-08-07T20:38:00.000-05:00

...or at least repurposed at some point. Yes, after nearly 10 years of faithful service, my little blue Linksys WRT54G has been unplugged and replaced by the router I purchased today. The Linksys was not failing or working incorrectly - actually it's probably been the most consistent piece of computer equipment I've ever owned. But it was finally starting to show it's age - no wireless N, no guest network, no gigabit, no IPv6, and I think now that I'm pushing more bandwidth through it, it wasn't always keeping up. I'm going to bring it to mom's house and plug it in there, and it will probably run another 10 years.

Any piece of technology that lasts 10 years (and is still useful) is pretty good...Linksys WRT54G, I salute you!

One Hit Wonders

2011-07-16T08:53:00.001-05:00

A fun little recap of "one-hit wonders" over the past 25 years (groups that had one hugely popular song and then nothing else):

http://new.music.yahoo.com/blogs/chart_watch/74387/chart-watch-extra-one-hit-wonders

I LOVE one-hit wonders, in fact I have an entire playlist on my iPod made up of just that. I don't like them BECAUSE they're one-hit wonders, I think I like them because they're unique and often don't fit into a typical category or sound. The same is true of groups that occasionally do a song that is totally out-of-character for the group. The biggest example that comes to mind is "Friday I'm In Love" by The Cure - I don't generally like music by The Cure, but I liked that song. And I generally don't like stuff by "Cake" either, but they did a whole album ("Comfort Eagle") that was completely different than the rest of their stuff, and I loved it.

There was even a (fictional) movie made about one-hit wonders, called "That Thing You Do", one of my all-time favorite movies, about a fictional 60s band called, appropriately, "The Wonders" and their quick rise to and fall from stardom. Fantastic movie and I love the song too.

So, one-hit wonders...we salute you!

Prime

2011-07-13T08:43:00.000-05:00

Yes, today is my birthday, and in mathematical terms I'm "in my prime" because my age is now a prime number :) I won't tell you which one, but if you know the general range of my age, you can probably guess.

A shout out to my friend Amber, who was born on the exact same day and year as me, in the same state, and born 3 minutes after me - we didn't know each other until a few years ago, and have been birthday buddies ever since.

One of the perks of birthdays for me is that by registering my email address with the 3 main coffee shops I go to (Caribou, Starbucks, and Dunn Brothers), I get a free drink on my birthday. Which means I have to have 3 coffee drinks on my birthday. But you can never have too much coffee right? So I started the morning with a Caribou White Chocolate Mocha...79g of carbs...I haven't had 79g of carbs IN A DAY since I started the Atkins diet 22 weeks ago (btw, I've lost 28 lbs now!) My body may go into sugar shock...I don't plan to get 3 mochas, I'll use the other drinks for something less sugary.

I am fortunate my birthday landed on a Wednesday this year because this week I have class Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday, Rochester PrideFest (IBM table) Saturday, not to mention work and homework. And given that we're leaving next Thursday evening for Maine for 5 days, I have two papers for school to have done before I leave, plus a project on Tuesday. So...I'm going to enjoy today! Early dinner with my cousins, later dinner with my friends.

OK, the sugar is setting in....too jittery to keep typing... :)

Electronic Rights

2011-07-11T12:59:00.001-05:00

An interesting article about a trial going on where the prosecution is arguing that the defendant is required to decrypt their hard drive:

http://news.cnet.com/8301-31921_3-20078312-281/doj-we-can-force-you-to-decrypt-that-laptop/

This is another case of laws not keeping up with technology - a problem that's going to get more and more prevalent as time goes on. I personally think that encryption is out there, it's going to be everywhere, and the government trying to stop it, have backdoors, or force a defendant to have to decrypt something isn't really going to work.

Good thought for the day

2011-07-11T09:02:00.000-05:00

Thanks to my most previous mortgage consultant, Dan Bieber, for this one (and btw, if you are ever looking for a mortgage person when buying or re-financing, I'd highly recommend Dan Bieber, he was fantastic to work with!)

"If you have a tendency to brag, just remember it's not the whistle that pulls the train." - O.F. Nichols

Dallas!

2011-07-08T15:26:00.001-05:00

Oh boy...I hate to admit that I'm WAY more excited about this than I should be....

http://news.yahoo.com/era-dallas-headed-tnt-next-summer-184534705.html

I grew up watching Dallas with my parents and grandparents, I remember people having "Who Shot J.R." parties during that season. I watched them again when TNN re-ran them in 1997, and more recently on TNT somewhere around 2007. At some point I want to get the DVDs when they get dirt cheap.

Why do I like this show? Much of the later seasons aren't even that good - after "the dream season" it went downhill quickly, and the last season shouldn't have even happened. But it still has this quirky 80s appeal...and it's about as opposite of reality TV as you can get, so maybe that's another reason I like it. Or maybe I secretly want to be a Texas oil baron (yeah right!)

Anyway...I don't have satellite or cable anymore, but I'm guessing I will be able to stream it from somewhere this fall.

Happy 4th - freedoms that we fight for

2011-07-04T08:43:00.000-05:00

I wish everyone a safe and blessed 4th of July today as our country turns 235 years old. I have many wonderful family memories of past July 4th days as I know many people do. (For those of you not in Minnesota, I hope you have as nice a weather weekend as we have had here, today looks to be absolutely beautiful!)

I saw this article among CNN's headlines yesterday, about a soldier, Andrew Wilfahrt from Minnesota who served and tragically died in Afghanistan. He was very intelligent and highly respected and liked by his superiors and peers. He was also gay, and is believed to be the first gay soldier to die in combat after the lift of the DADT military ban by congress.

Just this summer, the Minnesota legislature voted to place an amendment on the 2012 ballot to bar same-sex marriage in Minnesota (and a reminder that there is already a Minnesota law that bans same-sex marriage on the books). People like Corporal Wilfahrt, gay Americans who are serving (and dying) to protect our country's freedoms are not allowed to return home and have the freedom to marry the person they love. They are barred from the very freedoms they are dying to protect. I hope people consider this next November when they're casting their ballots and voting on this amendment.

Compromise and Rational Evaluation

2011-06-27T21:01:00.000-05:00

I'm not posting this because the author agrees with my own views on the topic, but because of his rational analytical approach to how he reached (and changed and evolved!) his views on same-sex marriage:

http://www.cnn.com/2011/OPINION/06/27/frum.gay.marriage/index.html

I really wish that our politics didn't have to be this "all-or-nothing", "black-or-white" thing - when you actually ask people more in-depth what their opinions are on this or many other topics, the answers are a lot more complex and across-the-board. But those kinds of things don't fit into 30-second sound bytes, political speeches, news headlines, or 2-minute news segments. And they don't force people to polarize, which seems to be the objective of most politicians (on both sides of the aisle!)

TV no more?

2011-06-22T09:28:00.000-05:00

An interesting article from friend Bill, talking about something I've been saying for awhile now:

http://broadcastengineering.com/news/most-tv-content-moving-web-within-two-years/index.html

The article says that the major TV networks and players will be distributing 75% of their content via the internet within 2 years. That is a bit faster than I have been predicting - I'm not sure everyone has the bandwidth capacity yet for that - but I would guess within 5 years we'll be there for sure. Every device that comes out now is network-capable, and most have applications built-in to play Netflix, Hulu, or just general web browsers where you can play anything.

The big takeaway from this article is the idea that we need to stop thinking about TV shows as TV shows, movies as movies, etc. and realize that in the future they are all in the category of "video content" and the internet is content-type-agnostic. This also solves SO many technology problems of the past, where we all had to have very specific hardware for TV broadcast formats, cable formats, satellite boxes, etc. and upgrading to a newer technology took years because it meant everyone had to get new hardware. Now that this is all software (mostly) in these devices that are basically all just computers on one scale or another, rolling out something like a new HD standard or a new company like Netflix or a new network providing content will be much more open and easy.

We've been "off the TV grid" (meaning only getting over-the-air and internet-delivered content) for over a year now and we're loving it - and saving about $90/month in the process.

199 - Diet Conclusions

2011-06-20T14:29:00.001-05:00

(and, no I'm not "DONE" yet, "DONE" meaning I've reached my goal weight of 180 - but as an update, I just finished week 14, and I weighed in at 199 this morning - down 24 lbs)

I was going to do this post a few weeks ago, but I decided that I wanted to wait until I actually had more weeks and data to draw conclusions on. I will start again with the disclaimer that these are my own conclusions based on my own experiences, reading, and research. I am not a doctor or a medical professional and would advise anyone to talk with a doctor before making any changes concerning their diet or health.

I will also ask that you not confuse my passion for this topic with the idea that I am on some sort of crusade for or against, well, anything. I think the only crusade I'm on is against ignorance, and for people to know that THEY are ultimately in charge of their health. When it comes to weight, diet, exercise, etc., don't accept that there is no solution out there for you - everyone is different and there is no one right answer.

The mistakes I've made with diets in the past

The foremost mistake I've made in my first two weight-loss attempts was not having a long-term/lifetime plan and goals. The losing weight goals are fairly easy. But I need to have a plan in my head for what to do if I gain 5 or 10 lbs somewhere down the road - how to steer myself back on course without letting myself get 45 lbs overweight again. If you think of it as a permanent change or lifestyle change, it has to include a long-term plan.
If I am to do another marathon someday, I also must have a plan for my "in-training" eating and then a plan for getting back to my "not-in-training" eating when I'm finished. (Will I ever do another marathon? Maybe...it's really not an ideal way to stay in shape, I'd say it's more an "accomplishment" and not strategy for weight loss or healthy living)
During my 2004 Atkins, which was at the height of the low-carb hype/craze, there were a ton of low-carb "replacement" types of products - shakes, ice cream (boy do I miss Kemps Caramel Cow Tracks low-carb!), things made out of protein flour, etc. - the goal of these products, besides making money, was to try to replace the high-carb versions so you didn't feel so "deprived". I bought a lot of them, and they certainly worked. However, I don't think it really helped me break the mental addiction I have to those "comfort" carb foods. This time around, the hype is all gone and there aren't all those products, and I'm focusing on eating good, quality, real, whole foods and not trying to replace the carb stuff.

The myths about low-carb diets

MYTH: Dr. Charles Atkins died of his own diet. REALITY: Dr. Atkins died of complications from a head injury he suffered falling off of a ladder.
MYTH: Low-carb diets are hard on your kidneys. REALITY: High-protein diets have the POSSIBILITY of being hard on your kidneys. Low-carb diets like Atkins replace most of the carb calories with fiber and fat. A general guideline I've read in exercise and weight training books is that a person consume a minimum of 1g of protein per 3 lbs of body weight. If you're somewhere around that, it is unlikely that you will have kidney issues (of course, always check with your doctor!!!)
MYTH: Low-carb diets raise your cholesterol and triglycerides because you consume more cholesterol and fat. REALITY: Besides the articles I've linked below, numbers generally speak for themselves. You should absolutely be checking these numbers at your regular physical examination with your doctor.
MYTH: Low-carb diets work because you actually consume less calories. REALITY: Well, actually, in some instances people might eat less calories. I personally don't know if I do or not because I do not count calories. But the questions that should be asked are "why do you eat less calories?" and "does it really matter?" If you can lose weight, don't get hungry, aren't depriving or starving your body, and can eat more food any time if you really need to, the number of calories you're actually consuming seems kind of irrelevant. (also see my own conclusions on the self-limiting nature of proteins and fats).

Why a low-carb diet works for me

I really do believe that I have a carbohydrate addiction that is some combination of physical and mental. For me, eating something sweet or highly starchy produces a reaction in my body similar to the reaction that people with other addictions (drug, alcohol, gambling, etc.). I only know a limited amount of science on the topic, but I understand that it has to do with dopamine levels among other things.

As is the case with many physical addictions, the only way to stop them is to stop doing whatever the addiction is. Now, if you have a food addiction, obviously you can't just stop eating food. I think many people (including me) incorrectly assume that they have a food addiction though, when what they really have is that addict/dopamine reaction to sugar and high-glycemic carbs. After a few weeks of cutting that stuff out, my physical cravings were gone and have not returned.

This time around, I've tried to be particularly aware of the mental process that goes on when it comes to my food choices. A good example is the coffee shop, where I love my mochas and lattes. Now, I love me my coffee, and I get my big mug full every morning and enjoy it all morning at work or at home. But frequently in the afternoons, or when I'm away from home, I get the urge to go get a mocha or a latte. Sure, they taste good, but why, really, do I want them vs. having a decaf cup of coffee, which is probably just as satisfying to my love of coffee? What I've found is that, in my head, I tend to view these kinds of treats as both "celebrations" for when I'm in a good mood, and "pick-me-ups" for when I'm in a bad mood (and sometimes just plain time-filler for when I'm bored!). Occasionally that is probably a good thing. Every day, sometimes multiple times a day? That is a dependence. I have similar feelings at home about chips or crackers or other snacks - when I start to question WHY I actually want something, I've had similar insights.

My own "big picture" conclusions

Human beings that lived "pre-agriculture" were hunters and gatherers. Their diets were primarily seeds, nuts, berries, fruits, and animals they hunted for food. Agriculture - the ability to grow things like wheat in mass quantities, has really only been around "en masse" for a few hundred years, which is a tiny fraction of human history. So, regardless of your beliefs on the origin of human beings, it would stand to reason that the human body was designed and/or evolved to operate on that pre-agriculture/hunters-and-gatherers type of diet.

In the earlier part of last century through the 50s, it is estimated that 5% of the population was obese. There was no non-organic food, no bleached flour, very little pre-packaged and processed food, no high fructose corn syrup, and sugar was not added to everything. People of our grandparents generation ate real, whole food - eggs, real butter (or lard!), whole milk, fruits, vegetables, and meat. Carbohydrates back then consisted of fruits, nuts, seeds, and whole-grains. As we got into the 70s, 80s, and 90s, more and more processed, pre-packaged carbohydrates became available, many touted as "low-fat" as the push toward low-fat diets continued. And yet, obesity numbers have steadily increased over that period - depending on which sets of numbers you look at, 35-60% of people are now considered overweight or obese (it's certainly larger than 5%!)

Again, I would always encourage anyone to do their own research, and certainly find something that works for you and do it. And of course consult with your doctor, but also remember that YOU are ultimately in charge of your own health, and that there is no "one-size-fits-all" doctor or solution for everyone - if it were actually that easy we wouldn't have problems!

Minnesota

2011-05-14T07:49:00.000-05:00

I've been following the news and Facebook posts concerning the Minnesota Legislature's current attempt to put a constitutional amendment banning same-sex marriage onto the 2012 general election ballot. Thirty-one states have had similar state amendments put on their ballots over the last 15 years, and 31 states have approved them (one state rejected the first attempt and passed it the second time). Most political analysis tends to show that, in large part, conservative politicians tend to want so-called "wedge" issues like this on a ballot because it gets conservative voters to show up on election day, and likely vote for conservative politicians.

My response so far has been to write letters to my state senator and state representative, both Republicans (District #29, Dave Senjem and Duane Quam). Senator Senjem has already voted for this in the senate, and the house has not yet voted. I expressed my disappointment to Senator Senjem, and to both I asked them how they would feel if the right to marry their wife and have the legal protections that their wife and children have was put onto a ballot for voters to decide on. I also pointed out that over the next year and a half, I, like many other people in my situation, will be spending our time, energy, and probably money campaigning to defeat this amendment, instead of spending our time, energy, and money on our families, and doing things that actually make a difference (for me, that is the volunteering I do at church and the animal shelter, and the community bands I play in, not to mention the time I will be spending on my master's degree).

The response I am expecting from my elected officials (if I get any at all) is that they're not voting for a marriage ban, they're voting to give Minnesotans the right to vote and make the decision themselves. Which is a complete political cop-out. If that is really how they believe things should be (that we should all vote on everything ourselves), then we do we have elected officials? It is also important to point out that 301 out of the last 304 proposed constitutional amendments were NOT passed on to voters. So the VAST majority of the time, the legislature does NOT believe that people should have the right to vote on an issue themselves.

The constitution should be HARD to change or amend. Our US constitution only has 26 amendments in almost 250 years. Some states, like Iowa, require that the legislature pass a proposed amendment in two consecutive sessions (i.e. 2 years apart) before it goes to the ballot. Other states have similar rigorous procedures like requiring 2/3 majorities. The US constitution requires that, after it gets through the senate and house, that 3/4 of all of the states ratify an amendment in a general election. 3/4!!! All to make sure that amendments are taken seriously. Minnesota? Legislative majority, and popular vote majority in one election. Governor has no power to do anything. Minnesota Supreme Court can't overturn an amendment. Where are the checks and balances here?

Friend Shelley shared a good blog post with me from Nick Coleman on the topic. A recent poll hows that over half of Minnesotans don't support amending the constitution for this issue. But history also shows that even when poll numbers show that something isn't going to happen in an election, sometimes it still does (Proposition 8 in California in 2008). So, despite the best efforts of me and a lot of other people over the next year and a half, it's very possible that this amendment will pass, and that my right to marry the person I love will be taken away in Minnesota forever (forever = it would take another amendment to nullify this one, which would probably mean years more of time, energy, money, campaigning, etc.).

Oh, and in case you didn't know, there is already a law on the books in Minnesota prohibiting same-sex marriage. Yes, that law could be overturned by a court or repealed by a legislature. But that has not happened, and so even if this amendment fails, I still don't have the right to marry the person I love.

For the first time since I've lived in Minnesota (and just so you know, I've lived in Minnesota the majority of my life, from age 1 to 8, and from age 22 to 36, a total of 21 out of 36 years), I am really considering whether I will be living here for the rest of my life.

Willpower

2011-05-03T12:20:00.000-05:00

My good friend Shelley writes a world-renowned blog on Debt Reduction. One of her most recent articles talks about the temptation/struggle of excess spending when you actually have more money to spend (vs. saving and wiser, more planned uses of money). This got me thinking about how we all have temptations we have to deal with, and the willpower we use to deal with them.

I have gone 7 straight weeks on the Atkins diet now, and have not cheated or slipped once (yes, not even once, not even a little bit!) That's been the case on every diet I've ever seriously committed to, marathon training I've done, weight lifting programs I've been on, etc. People look at that and tell me that I must have extraordinary "willpower". It's fun to get a compliment like that, but I'll admit that in this case what they're calling "willpower" is really rooted in what I would describe as an "obsessive" personality (to a degree anyway). Once I decided to start doing this diet, there are clear rules to follow and I have no trouble following them and almost nothing can make me deviate from clear rules (that I've decided to follow). This phase of the diet is very simple and safe for me - follow the rules and you will lose weight. There are no decisions to make, no optional paths to follow. Two good recent examples - Thursday Erin baked a whole bunch of cookies for work, and many were still out (and they smelled SO good!). I was home alone, no one would know. Did I flinch? No, not really. Almost no force on earth would have made me eat one of those cookies, because the rules were in place in my head, and I was following them. Last night after handbell practice, one of my dear friends brought in some leftover wedding cake from her daughter's wedding, which I attended earlier this year. I had had a piece of this cake at the wedding reception, and it was some of the best cake I'd ever had. Did I flinch? No. The only potential hard thing I might have had to deal with was offending someone by not taking a piece of cake, and having to explain why. But pretty much nothing would have made me want to eat a piece of that cake.

What's going to be the hard part? The reason why I end up in these situations needing to be on diets in the first place? That will come when I've lost all the weight I want to lose. "Eating in the Real World" is what Atkins calls it, and the South Beach book has a similar section. For some people this is much easier than the diet itself - "moderation" is what it's called. Enjoy that occasional cookie or piece of wedding cake, and do a good job the rest of the time. My personality doesn't seem to work that way though. I don't know how to enjoy an occasional treat without the "rules" in my head having to be altered. I don't know how to skip a day of marathon training (I did miss days but they were always for planned reasons). For me the easy part is now. The hard part is yet to come.

15

2011-05-02T10:52:00.000-05:00

Life has sort of interrupted my blogging as of late, but a few updates...

On Easter Sunday, we managed to plant almost all of our garden (the nicest day in the last two weeks weather-wise). We took a more minimalist approach this year and didn't do seedlings and just planted the seeds, we'll see how it turns out. Erin is still looking at getting grape vines strung up too.

Very excited about our forthcoming retaining walls, which may not happen now until early June because the weather isn't cooperating, but it's going to be great when they're done. Very ready to get out there and plant trees and rose bushes!

Got to see my two nieces this weekend, and niece #3 who is forthcoming in July :) Not the greatest weather weekend but we did see the movie "Rio" which was just plain fun as far as movies go.

And last but not least...after 7 weeks of faithfully following my low-carb diet, I am down 15 lbs this morning, feel great, and am not having any problems sticking to it. If the weather would ever cooperate, I might even get outside more :)

Camp Companion

2011-04-14T21:28:00.000-05:00

I just have to give a general shout out to the wonderful group of people that is Camp Companion of Rochester - I don't know that I've EVER witnessed such an active group of people in any organization anywhere. I love to go to their Facebook page and just see all the animals being rescued, treated, adopted, so many all the time! We adopted our 3 cats from them and they are just wonderful to work with. And all of this is done via foster homes - quite an undertaking and quite amazing.

https://www.facebook.com/campcompanion

100 Miles!

2011-04-12T20:07:00.001-05:00

A little lighter of a post, and a shout out of my friend Wayne, who attempted his first 100-mile run. And is a great storyteller :) I owe the birth of my entire running career to Wayne, before I met him I never thought I'd run 10 miles in my lifetime, and by the next summer after we met he had me running his 10 and 20 mile training runs with him, just for fun.

Now, I've done 3 marathons, which are 26.2 miles, and they took me between 4 1/2 to 5 hours to finish. And I was dead by the time I finished. Now, think about doing that do that 4 times in a row.

Or, to put it in a different perspective - how long does it take you to even DRIVE 100 miles?

Congrats Wayne, even though you ONLY got through 80 out of 100 :) (and he says he's going to do another one in a few months, wow!)

My History with Carbohydrates

2011-04-09T21:50:00.000-05:00

I have come to learn that that I am a carbohydrate addict to some degree. I'm not really even sure if I know what that means, but over the course of my life, and especially in later years, there was something more to wanting something sugary or starchy than just being hungry. Whether it be a slight alteration of my route somewhere so I could stop and get an afternoon mocha, or an attempt to cure a low energy or down part of the day...it was definitely pre-meditated.

In many cases when someone has an addiction to something, they try to just quit doing it entirely - smoking, alcohol, gambling, or whatever it is that interferes with life. When it comes to food though, it isn't as simple - obviously we can't just stop eating food entirely. But, in 2004, at 215lbs, and after several friends of mine had been having success with the low-carb diets, and despite this being contrary to all "conventional diet wisdom", my curious side got the best of me and I started reading. There were two books out at the time getting the most traction - "Dr. Atkins New Diet Revolution" and "The South Beach Diet". I read both of them. And even then I had lots of skepticism - how could all this stuff about low-fat, high-carb, calories in < calories out, the food pyramid, etc. possibly have been wrong all these years?

However, I was also had a great exercise routine going, including a lot of power weight training, and I knew that whatever I did had to be high enough in protein so that my muscles could recover from their workouts (I was already supplementing with protein shakes). So, on Saturday, January 10th, 2004, after the holiday eating had "cleared", I went to the grocery story and stocked up on all the food I would need (and also got rid of or gave away all my "carb" food).

I won't explain all the details of Atkins, but every low-carb diet has a similar set of phases - an "induction" phase with almost no carbs at all that resets your body so that you get off of the sugar spikes/lows you're used to with high-carb diets, an intermediate phase (or two) where you slowly add stuff back in, and a lifetime maintenance phase where you figure out how many carbs you can eat without losing weight, and presumably adjust it over the rest of your life.

The main difference though, between a low-carb diet and other more "conventional" diets, is that besides having to limit carbs (either by # of grams per day, or by the foods you are eating), you eat normally, and if you're hungry, you eat. For me, this was huge for two reasons - I knew I wouldn't be starving my body, my muscles, etc., and I also knew that I'd never get to that point in the day where I'd have eaten all my allotted "portions" (calories, servings, etc.) and couldn't eat anymore. If I really wanted to eat some more, I could - just not carbs.

Dr. Atkins does say that the first couple of days when you stop eating carbs altogether, your body will try to fight you. The first time I did this, it really took a whole week of feeling like I was in a fog, but I now realize that the main reason for that was probably the fact that I was also giving up caffeine completely at the same time - and before that I was a coffee + 5-6 can/day diet pop drinker. Besides that week though, every day after that I generally felt better, and had lost 10 lbs in two weeks (Dr. Atkins does mention that a few pounds of that are usually water weight). After two weeks I continued to phase 2, where you add back 5g of carbs every day for a week, then the next week you add back 5g more, etc. while monitoring your weight loss, until you're losing about 1 lb/week.

According to the log I kept, I went from 215 to 185 in about 4 months, and trickled down to 180 after that. By the summer, I was a healthy, in-shape 180 doing power weight training and cardio. I was never hungry, never tired (after week 1), and at my physical all my cholesterol, triglyceride, blood sugar, and blood pressure numbers were fantastic. I might have been in the best shape of my life. So you think, "wow, it worked", huh? Yes, it did. And that could have been the end of the story, had I stuck with the lifetime maintenance plan and just controlled my carb intake (and by controlled, we're talking 80-150g a day depending on physical activity, which is NOT that hard to accomplish).

But that's not the end of the story. And not because of Atkins or low-carb. I kept in great shape the rest of 2004 into 2005. And then...I started marathon training again. Anyone who is a runner knows that when you run 30-40 miles per week, you just can't gain weight, and for long runs you generally want some more "quick" energy, the kind that comes in carbs. Which is fine, because when you're running those kinds of miles, you burn it all off. But, as in 1999, once I started eating like a high-mile runner, I didn't have a plan to stop eating that way when I was done running. I actually did another marathon in 2006, so I kept on that high-energy-burning routine through June 2006, when I finished my 3rd marathon. I was still in fantastic shape - around 175 and could run 20+ miles at a time :) But, alas, when all that high-mile running stopped, the high-mile eating didn't.

(Do you see a pattern here?) It was summer, I was in great shape, I'd just run 2 marathons in two years, why should I give up eating all the ice cream, cookies, chips, crackers (pick your favorite carb) that I want? I will get back to the "good" eating "pretty soon".

"Pretty soon" turned out finally be nearly 5 years later, in March 2011. At 223 lbs, the most I've ever weighed in my entire life, I'd gained 43 lbs, stopped exercising, and, for 2 straight years at my annual physical my cholesterol, triglyceride, and blood pressure numbers have gotten progressively worse. Somewhere in those 4 years I tried an "all organic foods" diet, which might have helped me eat better quality food, but didn't help me lose any weight. I also half-heartedly tried to start the South Beach Diet, but, at least for me, it was not structured enough for me to not stray on (I think some people find that a lot easier).

So, March 14th, 2011, I started Atkins again, this time with some experience and hopefully a little smarter. There's also been a lot of new studies and science in 7 years, which was great and helpful to read. Yesterday I finished week 4 and am down 13 lbs to 210. My long-term target is 180 again, but I now see this as a lifetime thing, so if it takes a year to get there I'm ok with that. I've also started back into some regular exercise - I ran a mile last Thursday, a far cry from the 26.2 I had been running, but I suppose you have to start somewhere :)

One more post (I know I said 3, but hey it's my blog and I want to write some conclusions), which will include some of the more useful and interesting links I've found pertaining to studies on carbohydrates, cholesterol, and saturated fat.

My History with Diets

2011-04-09T21:22:00.000-05:00

I never tried any official "diet" or organized plan of any sort until I started working full-time in 1997 after I graduated from college. I went through various phases of trying to eat less or exercise more, or drink diet pop, etc. etc. but none of these really had any plan or goal, and of course I never really stuck to them. Besides the junior year of college when I somehow dipped down to 185, I had hovered around 200 most of my post-7th grade life (to 215 in May of 1997).

Two things changed when I started working and living on my own - I had a LOT more free time all of a sudden (all I had to do was work, which was WAY less than all the stuff I had going on at school) and I had total control of what I was eating now - I bought my own groceries, made my own meals, and ate out when I wanted to.

So in the fall of 1997, after I got settled into my job, I found a diet book I had gotten awhile back called "The Clinic 30 Program". This diet was based on the "conventional" diet thinking we've all had pounded into our heads since elementary school health class - low-fat, high-carb, high-protein, eat less calories (the food pyramid we all remember!). All "modern" medical science at that time was in agreement (or so I thought anyway) about that, so I figured it must be right! This particular program was set up so that you could have a specific number of servings of each of the food groups - 4 bread/cereal, 7 meat/protein, 2 vegetable, 2 dairy, 3 fruit, and 1 fat. A "serving" is about what you'd expect - a slice of bread, an ounce of meat, a piece of fruit, a vegetable, an 8 oz glass of milk, and fat was like a pat of butter. So this was an extremely low-fat diet. Basically, if you eat all your servings every day, that's about 1300-1400 calories a day.

I actually have all of the paper charts I used to keep track of what I ate every day, and my progress. I started at 210 lbs on 9/22/1997. I followed the program (there were 3 phases) seriously for over a year, and then off-and-on for another year and a half after that (when I started marathon training in 1999 I stopped - remember that point for later :)

I got down to 170 on 6/29/1998 (actually got down to 167 two days later, but that was because of the stomach flu, so it doesn't really count). I also completely trashed my body and lost almost all of my muscle mass. For the first several weeks of the diet I felt like I was starving all the time (and now I know that I was starving my body!) The diet did not emphasize making healthier food choices, only counting calories and servings, and I still wasn't in the habit of eating vegetables and fruit, so most of my days I really only ate my bread/cereal, meat, and fat servings (I did eat more fruit as I went on because I was so hungry). I was probably fortunate that by the time I got to my "goal" weight I had started running, and also joined the Rochester Athletic Club and had started lifting weights regularly, because it sort of forced me to eat more and kept my muscle from completely disappearing. Looking back, I think that the abuse and stress I was putting on my body with that diet caused me to get sick a lot more - I had a lot of stomach flus and other "tummy" issues.

I ran a lot in 1998 and did a full marathon in 1999. You don't gain weight doing marathon training, no matter what you eat :) After I was done with the marathon in Oct 1999 though, I stopped doing all the running I was doing, but I kept eating like I was doing all that running. So, by March 2000, I was back to 200 again.

Between 2000 and 2003, because of the amount of physical activity I was doing, I stayed between 190 and 200. But I slowly crept up to 215 again by the beginning of 2004, and I decided I needed to figure out something better...

Next post...why I now understand and believe that carbohydrates hold the key to our weight (and maybe a lot of our health)

My History with Food and Weight

2011-04-09T20:44:00.000-05:00

(I am going to do this in 3 related posts so that they're not so long - and if you you just want to get to the main topic, skip to the 3rd one, although this stuff may make you appreciate it more)

Over the past ~ 4 years, I have once again let myself slowly slip into some bad habits when it comes to eating and exercise. While this isn't a yo-yo cycle for me, I can now see some trends that I've decided I need to break, hopefully once and for all.

I'll make a standard disclaimer before I start - I am not a doctor or a medical professional, and some of the information about diets and medically-related topics are based on my own reading, research, and experiences of what works for me. Everyone should consult a doctor before making any life-changing decisions related to their health. That being said...don't forget that YOU are ultimately responsible for your health. Doctors, as good as they are, can only make their best judgments on the information they know about you, and the information they know themselves, and even the best doctor on Earth still can't know everything about everything. I would encourage people to remember that it's ok to get a second opinion and that there is often more than one way to solve a medical or health problem.

So, I have issues with food. I have had them since I was very young, before I can even remember (according to my parents, somewhere around age 2 1/2). I was EXTREMELY picky as a child - I don't think I threw tantrums about much of anything, except probably food. You say, "yeah I was picky too, we all grow out of it". Well, to put it in perspective - most of my younger life, there were about 4 or 5 things I would eat (other than things like dessert which pretty much anyone eats, although I was even picky about that). I lived on peanut butter and crackers, fried chicken, bacon, toast, cereal, milk, Wild Berry Hi-C, and fruit rollups. I did not eat pizza until I was about 15, and then it was ONLY cheese pizza from Pizza Hut. As I got into high school, I figured out french fries were ok, as well as plain chicken sandwiches. I didn't eat any fruits or vegetables to speak of, unless you count corn-on-the-cob, during the one month in the summer when it was in season. Not until college did I even start edging my way out of my eating shell (a little).

I don't know exactly when I slipped into the "overweight" category as a kid, but I have one "reference point" I usually go with. In 7th grade in PE class, we did a unit on wrestling, and were divided up into weight classes. I was at 200 lbs by then - easily the biggest in my 7th grade class (to be fair, I was also the tallest at that point because I grew sooner than just about everyone). I hovered around 200 through most of high school, which at 5'10" (even with a large frame) is probably still too much.

In college, I actually got to some period during my junior year where I dropped down to about 185 - I wasn't really specifically trying to lose weight, but a combination of having a walking campus, taking a weight lifting class (that really de-mystified weight training which I've continued to do through most years after that) and maybe a lot of studying and stress, I just dropped some pounds. During my IBM co-op, I also worked out a lot because I had a lot of free time. Sadly, my senior year I think I over-endulged a bit on pretty much everything, and graduated college in 1997 at an out-of-shape 215, my all-time max weight then.

Next post...my attempts at diets, cardio, marathons, weight training, and how they worked.

Mario Fun

2011-03-19T21:33:00.001-05:00

A cool "first-person" view of SMB

Spay, neuter, adopt

2011-02-23T14:40:00.001-06:00

Probably preaching to the choir knowing who reads my blog, but this is a good one to pass on. Thank someone who volunteers at an animal shelter. Volunteer yourself.

Fun "Trick Quarterbacking" video

2011-02-09T12:21:00.000-06:00

And all from the 3rd string QB of the UConn Huskies...

Cool stuff where I work

2011-02-09T09:16:00.001-06:00

http://www.startribune.com/business/115533889.html?elr=KArksUUUycaEacyU

Super Bowl

2011-02-07T13:07:00.001-06:00

I didn't have a chance to watch the Super Bowl this year as I was driving home during that time, but I did listen to it a bit, and read about it this morning. While I have kind of stopped caring about the NFL (I am much more interested in college football these days) I thought this thing about Aaron Rodgers (the game MVP QB of the Packers) was cool:

http://espn.go.com/blog/rick-reilly-go-fish/post/_/id/826/aaron-rodgers-unforgettable-forgiveness

I've read and seen enough about him to know that this is generally how he is. I wish all players could have this kind of class and team attitude. I'd certainly enjoy watching the NFL a lot more if they did.

Flashback fun

2011-02-03T11:27:00.000-06:00

Thanks to friend Ryan for this one....

http://www.behance.net/Gallery/ALT1977-WE-ARE-NOT-TIME-TRAVELERS/545221

Many sci-fi shows deal with the topic of using time travel for financial gain. Fun to think about anyway...

When the star leaves...

2011-02-02T09:58:00.000-06:00

I posted this on Facebook too...it is rumored that Steve Carell is leaving "The Office" but that they are going to continue the show without him. Which started me thinking about shows over the years that lost their main character or star and tried to continue...here are the ones that come to mind (and some posted by other people to my Facebook post on the same topic):

"Sliders" - after 2 1/2 seasons, "The Professor" John Rhys-Davies left and the writers all got replaced. That was bad enough, but after Season 4 "Quinn" Jerry O'Connell left too, and the show just got ridiculous.
"The Dukes of Hazzard" - the season where "Bo and Luke" were replaced with similar-looking but much worse cousins "Vance and Coy". The producers thought the car and Daisy were what everyone watched the show for, and didn't want to bow in to the bigger contract demands of the Bo and Luke actors. They were wrong...and the show never really recovered.
"Valerie" - a show named for Valerie Harper. After several seasons, she left, and in the show they killed her off and replaced her with the aunt played by Sandy Duncan. This actually wasn't the worst replacement ever, and Jason Bateman expanded his role and became the star I think. Still wasn't nearly as good as the beginning.
"X-Files" trying to replace Mulder and Scully. Couldn't be done.
"Saved By The Bell" trying to go with similar-but-worse (if that is possible) next generation actors. And then attempting to revive the original actors by doing "The College Years". And yet people continued to watch...
"That 70s Show" without "Eric" Topher Grace. I think everyone thought there was enough other talent to keep going, and really the other actors were all very funny and good, but for some reason, the Eric character kind of held it all together. Never recovered.

Post some more of your favorites!

Fun catalog flashbacks

2011-01-27T09:28:00.001-06:00

Thanks to friend Matt for sharing this fun flashback to 70s catalog models

http://www.visualnews.com/2010/10/16/who-shot-the-couch-vintage-bad-fashions/

Cholesterol

2011-01-24T16:34:00.000-06:00

Thanks to friend Dan for the link to this one:

http://naturalcommunitiesmag.com/2010/06/28/cholesterol-friend-or-foe-2/

I've read an increasing number of articles saying that we've over-evilized eggs and that they actually provide a healthy amount of LDL/HDL cholesterol. I've also read articles that talk about how we aren't measuring the right thing when we test cholesterol levels (that we should be doing the test to see if our artieries are clogged instead) but it never really expained why. This article explains a lot more about that, and how our body uses cholesterol.

I am getting increasingly skeptical of drugs like cholesterol medication, given that they all have these horrible side effects on our liver. This further makes me wonder if all these drugs we take end up having more side effects and cause us to have more problems (which might make us take more drugs, etc. etc.)

Why "Christians" continue to get a bad name

2011-01-20T13:28:00.001-06:00

http://www.advocate.com/News/Daily_News/2011/01/19/Ala_Gov_Not_Christian_Not_Your_Brother/?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+AdvocatecomDailyNews+%28Advocate.com+Daily+News%29

The problems with separation of church and state aside (everyone has the right to their own personal opinions), this, to me, is the problem with how Christianity is viewed in our society. Most of you who know me know that I am a Christian, and I have a hard time understanding how someone who makes remarks like the Alabama governor is making could possibly be reading the same bible that I am reading. The "Golden Rule" in the Christian bible contains two parts - 1) You shall love the lord your God with all your heart, soul and mind, and 2) YOU SHALL LOVE YOUR NEIGHBOR AS YOURSELF.

Now, to me the first part is a personal relationship between a person and God. But the second part seems pretty clear - there are no exceptions on who is "your neighbor". That means everyone. Period. And it only takes a little bit of reading about the life of Jesus, for which "Christ"ianity is based on, to see that Jesus didn't hate people, exclude people, etc. Certainly, people have different opinions, different beliefs, different faiths, different religions, etc. The rule does not say "You shall agree with your neighbor as yourself". But someone who claims to be a Christian and yet isn't living part 2 of the "Golden Rule" and is ignoring the countless examples of it in the life of Jesus, to me, is a hypocrite. Period.

My Blackberry is broken

2011-01-06T08:36:00.000-06:00

Hilarious - thanks to friend Bill for sharing

Tecmo Super Memories

2010-12-23T06:22:00.001-06:00

I can totally see my friends Paul & Jeremy and I doing something like this with the thousands of hours we probably spent playing this game:

This is SO me at age 3

2010-12-21T16:28:00.000-06:00

Anyone who knew me when I was younger (particularly my mom) knows how, if pocket video cameras and YouTube existed back then, there would be a video of me doing this. It was in my blood...

Let It Snow

2010-12-20T13:27:00.000-06:00

In case anyone was in doubt about having a white Christmas in Minnesota, today's start pretty much guarantees it, barring some weird global climate change massive event (in which case snow is the least of our worries!)

I have not been consistent in blogging but intend to fix that as one of my New Year's resolution - I don't know how many people read, but I've found that at least some people do, because I've had people ask me why I stopped.

To recap some significant events of the last few months...

Going On In The Country/World:

-(this week) DADT stand-alone repeal bill is passed by the House and the Senate. Originally this was attached to some military budget/funding bill (which is usually done because the sponsors think it has no chance to pass on its own), and it failed. As a stand-alone bill, with bi-partisan support it passed. To me, that means: 1) Maybe congress should actually try passing bills on their merits instead of with earmarks and side-door deals, and 2) There is some hope that our government can actually work together when it wants to (and they're going to have to now if we have any hope of things getting better)
-The "It Gets Better" project continues to gain support by a wide range and variety of people and groups. This project was started, among others, by columnist Dan Savage, in response to all of the recent GLBT teen suicides. It saddens me to think that in 2010, kids are still taking their own life because they think (real or perceived) that their parents, family, friends, etc. think they are worthless, condemned, going to hell, or the like. Regardless of your own personal beliefs and values, NO one, especially a kid, should EVER have to feel that way.

Going On In My Corner:

-On October 30th, I made my annual trek to Nebraska, and saw the Huskers play Missouri (likely for the final time) and win 31-17 - it was a fantastic day, and along with Will & Amanda who always get me great tickets to go with them, cousin Andy and friend Tony were along.
-On November 11th, we became the proud "parents" of a third (and three is the limit!) cat, 6-month-old "Lady Zoya Mae Triped", who was found with a broken leg and taken to the shelter, where they tried to heal her, but the vet had to amputate her front right leg. However, the way she runs around and plays, you'd think she had 5 legs most of the time :) We love her very much and she has been a wonderful and energetic addition to the household.
-December 11th saw a huge snowstorm which kept us inside for more than two days - and many Rochester roads still haven't recovered (and today is going to pile onto that!).
-The Friday of that same weekend (10th) my server crashed. Many of you know that I am kind of a computer hobbyist and have a 4TB centralized server with all our music, movies, pictures, etc. While it has some safegards that allow a drive to fail (and be replaced without any consequence), two drives failing is too much :( I started doing full backups last year, but somehow hadn't done one since May 28th, so lost 7 months of pictures. So to everyone out there - BACKUP YOUR IRREPLACABLE DATA!!!!! And really, to be very safe, for things like pictures, you should back it up within your house, and also have an offsite backup (either with one of the many affordable online services, or burn them to DVDs and put in a safe deposit box or something). A tough lesson to learn, could have been worse I guess...
-Last weekend saw a whole slough of holiday parties, including an annual cookie baking party we love to attend - this year we made the Cinnabon cookies that Erin discovered the recipe for. The first time we made them, I think both of us were amazed at how good they were and how much they tasted like Cinnabon.

I have the next two weeks off (hooray!) and intend to relax, visit family, catch up on all sorts of things, watch more "Dexter" (Erin and I got hooked while we were stuck inside the house for 2 days) and "True Blood" (I owe friend Shelley some good hours of watching and wine).

Peace and blessings for everyone and their families during this season!

Perspective

2010-12-14T17:21:00.000-06:00

I have been absent from blogging for awhile, one of my new year's resolutions...but I felt like I needed to post this.

We have been paying a person to do our snow removal (our driveway/sidewalks) after my snow blower died last year, and he was always very reliable, punctual, and thorough. This weekend we had a big snowstorm here and no one came to clear on Sunday, Monday, and today...I called again this afternoon to see if I could get some kind of ETA and his message said that he had gotten sick on Sunday and went to the hospital and was diagnosed with cancer. Wow. After hearing that, I kind of just stopped and realized how my "problems" didn't seem quite so important, and how thankful I am to have the family and friends I have in my life.

I ask anyone reading this to take a second to send your prayers and positive thoughts and energy to Jeff, our snow removal guy, for good health and recovery.

Eclective Time

2010-11-19T15:49:00.000-06:00

I know I've been horribly absent in blogging as of late, but, this is part of the reason.

My band, "Eclective" is performing this evening (Friday, November 19th) at Prime Time Sports Bar in Burnsville, MN. We will start playing around 11:30 and close out the night. There are also two acts before us that are fantastic - check it all out on our Facebook page!

Hometown Animal Shelter

2010-11-04T13:07:00.000-05:00

Have been lax on the blogging with everything going on, but had to share this one. I recently reconnected with my 6th grade teacher on Facebook (she was one of my favorite teachers growing up) and found out she is heading up an animal shelter/care group, "Happy Paws". It was great to be able to make a donation to an animal shelter in my hometown.

http://plattsmouthanimalshelter.com/

And in related news, we'll be getting a third cat sometime soon (hopefully very soon!) - she was found with a broken leg and has had a fairly long road to recovery and had to have one of her front legs amputated. She is fine now (runs around just like any cat) but we're waiting on the last traces of ringworm to disappear before we bring her home (our cats had ringworm when we got them and we don't want to repeat that one).

Rethinks on the keyboard

2010-11-01T13:33:00.001-05:00

Neat stuff for mobile devices...I can see myself using this, my fat fingers are prone to error on autocorrect.

http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/10/11/01/1515236/8pen-Reinvents-the-Keyboard-For-Mobile-Devices?from=rss

It Gets Better campaign - Google

2010-10-21T10:26:00.000-05:00

I already like Google from a technology standpoint, but this is very commendable from a humanity standpoint...

It Gets Better campaign

2010-10-15T15:24:00.000-05:00

This has been a fantastic story to see unfolding (and I love the power of the internet).

http://news.yahoo.com/s/yblog_upshot/20101015/pl_yblog_upshot/surprising-new-it-gets-better-videos

(the "It Gets Better" campaign was started by columnist Dan Savage in response to the recent rash of gay teen suicides - article here)

I was fairly lucky that I never got harassed or beaten up or anything like that in school, I guess I was big enough and did enough "non-gay" stuff to get by. I don't know what my home town high school is like in 2010, but I'm sure in 1990 I would not have been able to have been openly gay in high school without being beaten up (or worse).

No kid should have to go through this, regardless of what anyone's personal beliefs on the subject are, and it's the responsibility of ALL adults, parents, teachers, leaders, etc. to make sure that a kid never gets to the point of feeling like they have to take their own life.

This is why sci-fi is fun...

2010-09-24T11:14:00.000-05:00

Thanks to friend Ryan for this one:

http://www.avclub.com/articles/yesterdays-enterprisethe-offspring,45195/

"Yesterday's Enterprise" was by far my favorite Star Trek:The Next Generation episode, mostly because it was just good, but also that it was a single, "non-epic" episode that still affected and connected entire series story arcs. This is one of those that really makes you think about the significance of a single decision or event, and how it can affect so much of the future. Good stuff....

Video Game memories...

2010-09-17T18:07:00.001-05:00

A few fun video game nostalgia links....

First, to make all of you 80s kids feel old, Happy 25th Birthday Mario!

Second, also probably for the 80s kids, The Greatest 100 NES (Nintendo Entertainment System) games of all time. Even before reading it, I guessed (correctly) Super Mario Bros 3 was #1....but this has sparked a lively debate between myself and some other friends. It all depends on what you define as "greatest" - largely it's probably a subjective and personal choice, but you might factor in things like how many were sold, how much of an "impact" a game had, how many hours you spent playing it, if it's still being played, etc. If I had to choose #1's in categories for myself....

Favorite NES game overall - Super Mario Bros 3

NES game I spent the most hours playing -Tecmo Super Bowl (by far, an insane amount probably)

NES game I was most "intrigued" by - The Legend of Zelda

The ones I still play today - Super Mario Bros [1], The Legend of Zelda, Zelda II

NES game that I thought had the most "impact" on video games - Super Mario Bros [1] - without that game, Nintendo probably never would have existed, it was HUGE leap forward in video games (from single-screen, never-ending games to scrolling games with a "goal") and has spawned off the most succesful game series in history.

So...there you have it. The debate rolls on. Just remember, if you're still playing NES games, up-up-down-down-left-right-left-right-B-A-start

:)

Cyclones and Big Red!

2010-09-04T10:19:00.001-05:00

After a very busy week of work, a 5-hour band practice, and a rainy-turned-sunny band gig at Thursdays on First (thanks to everyone who came down to watch!) I am looking forward to a wonderful, relaxing 3-day Labor Day weekend! Started out Friday with our development cluster at working being shut down at noon, which effectively meant we couldn't do much, so after the traditional Friday man-lunch at Famous Dave's, headed home and after tying up a few more work loose ends, made some tea and curled up with a book as the weather outside was cold and rainy (high of 63...yeah right!)

Happy Hour at Catch 22 with some friends and a later evening get-together with some others capped off Friday.

And today...the official opening Saturday of college football. It all started earlier on Thursday night with my alma mater Iowa State Cyclones beating Northern Illinois 27-10! And tonight, Nebraska opens at home against Western Kentucky at 6pm. This is my first college football season "off the TV grid", the Nebraska game would have been available on PPV but I can either listen or join one of my Nebraska buddies at one of the sports bars and watch there.

To update my "off the TV grid" quest status - I knew college football was likely going to be the toughest of the things to be able to replicate because it's live so you can't watch after-the-fact videos or buy them on DVD or whatever. I still get the main OTA broadcast channels including ABC which is where many of the games are on, and I am now learning about ESPN3.com which streams MANY of the day's games (including some of the ones that are on regular ESPN). So for me anyway, that leaves the games that are on Fox Sports Net as "unavailable" to me at home. Which will be somewhat of a problem this year, but next year when Nebraska is in the Big 10 and on the Big Ten Network, I see that they are going to provide live internet streaming. The main downside is that these probably won't be in HD - but I imagine that will change.

So far I haven't had to upgrade my internet connection speed, but it is probably inevitable if I can start streaming HD and doing things like Netflix. But even a $10 or $20 increase in my ISP bill is still an $80 savings over what I was paying for satellite (and internet speed-ups benefit all my internet usage - working at home, browsing, email, etc.).

Otherwise we haven't missed having "grid" TV at all - most of the TV we've watched in the summer has been DVD/computer video stuff, including catching up on some seasons of TV shows we had missed.

Shameless self-promotion

2010-08-30T15:27:00.001-05:00

...and encouraging people to come to Thursdays on First this week and eat, drink, and be merry! In particular...from 4pm-5:30pm on the south stage (next to Bilotti's and Dooley's on First Ave) will be...my band! From Bob Marley reggae to Aretha Franklin soul to Santana, we will be doing some great tunes!

Come one, come all!

DADT

2010-08-30T11:46:00.000-05:00

There are so many of these stories I don't generally forward them (just hop on youtube and search on "DADT" and you'll see them) but this is an example of the perfectly good servicepeople and officers that we're discharging for absolutely no good reason. This guy was discharged despite keeping quiet about his personal life and despite both his captain and chief saying how good a serviceman he was and how much they needed him back on duty.

Wesley Snipes as Geordi???

2010-08-25T11:28:00.000-05:00

Another fun one for all you Star Trek TNG fans:

http://www.lettersofnote.com/2010/08/star-trekcasting.html

We're in trouble...

2010-08-25T08:42:00.000-05:00

I know you can edit video and find stupid people, but the fact that there are even THIS MANY functioning adult people in our country that don't know some of the most simple things about history and current events is tragic.

Video Game nostalgia

2010-08-24T13:13:00.001-05:00

All of you that played Atari 2600 games will remember these:

http://www.rundlc.com/news/the-misleading-world-of-atari-box-art-part-two-xbox-live/

I think it was kind of fun to imagine what the game would actually look like/do based on the graphic on the front of the game. Now we're pretty much there :)

10 ideas to change the world

2010-08-24T12:49:00.001-05:00

A neat/short pictoral article with some great simple ideas. Thanks to friend Dan for this one:

http://www.cnn.com/2010/LIVING/08/23/10.simple.things/index.html?hpt=C2

Big Band Weather

2010-08-16T16:28:00.000-05:00

Lots of fun and beautiful weather going on last night in Pine Island, as I subbed on lead alto for the "Rochester Big Band", a band I've played with in the past. The Pine Island crowd at the band shell was great, the weather was great, and I don't think I'll ever get tired of playing big band music :)

An overall productive weekend, including our "kitty" life returning to normal as Fluffy Face is now out of kitty jail and we're slowly letting him back into more rooms. It's nice to see them both back chasing each other around and laying in their favorite spots by the window on the couch. Besides investing in a second identical litter box (so they each have their "own"), I purchased some cat-calming plugins from catfaeries.com, as well as cleaning the spots Fluffy Face has had accidents on a number of times with the special "kitty-be-gone" scent-removing enzyme.

In the coming weeks I'll be gearing up for what should be a great musical evening, playing saxophone with my friend Dan's "put-together" band. We had our first rehearsal last week and WOW is there some talent there. We are playing from 4pm-5:30pm at the south stage of Thursdays on First on September 2nd, opening for the feature band that evening. I encourage everyone to come out and have some drinks at Dooley's pub and sit and take in the great music :)

Some historical geek stuff

2010-08-15T13:32:00.000-05:00

First, George Lucas must need to buy another few ranches or something, because here come the Star Wars movies on...Blu Ray.

http://www.engadget.com/2010/08/14/george-lucas-officially-announces-star-wars-on-blu-ray-in-2011/

I have purchased the "original" ep 4, 5, and 6 four times now - the original VHS tapes (Han shoots first), the THX remastered VHS (Han shoots first) which was a dumb purchase because I didn't have a sound system to handle the better sound at the time, Special Edition VHS widescreen (Greedo shoots first, Jabba in Star Wars, super cleaned up special effects, extra Darth Vader walk scene in Empire), and finally the Special Edition DVD widescreen (Anakin at the end has been replaced by the Episode 2 and 3 Anakin). I doubt I'll be buying the Blu-Rays unless something changes - I haven't dove into Blu-Ray yet and don't plan to, as I predict in 5 years physical media will be obsolete in favor of everything being streamed/online.

Second, a fun "comparison" article between the Apple II graphics tablet (from 1979) and the Apple iPad:

http://www.computerworld.com/s/article/9180224/Face_off_1979_Apple_Graphics_Tablet_vs._2010_Apple_iPad

Of course realistically there is no comparison, but it is a great illustration of how technology has changed between 1979 and 2010. I think one of the most interesting points is that the graphics pad was $650 in 1979, the iPad and its thousands of times more advanced technology is $499 in 2010. $650 in 1979 is $1900 in 2010 adjusted for inflation. So for roughly 1/4 of the cost of the 1979 graphic pad we are getting the iPad.

I didn't have a graphics pad, but I did have two Apple IIGS's, and grew up learning to program on Apple IIe's and original MacIntoshes. I remember the memory card we added to our IIGS - originally it comes with 512k of memory (k!!!!) and there was a huge card you could buy, roughly the size of a VHS tape, that added another 512k (k!!!). I just bought two tiny 2G (gig!!!!) memory modules that were about the size of a half a credit card.

And the original Apple IIGS processor? 1MHz (one megahertz). My current Intel core i7 is 3GHz (three gigahertz). My phone processor is 1GHz. The processor in the TV is probably at least 300MHz, heck the fridge probably has a microprocessor bigger than that, the ABS in my car uses at least a 486/66MHz processor :)

North Dakota Bois

2010-08-15T13:30:00.000-05:00

Another great Katy Perry parody :)

Rubik

2010-08-15T06:48:00.000-05:00

I love that 30 years later, the Rubik's cube is still in the news:

http://videogames.yahoo.com/events/plugged-in/study-uncovers-every-possible-rubik-s-cube-solution/1407748

Corporations should stay out of politics...

2010-08-13T09:34:00.001-05:00

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Liberal-groups-push-to-apf-2321043209.html?x=0

I'll refrain from commenting on the particular situation with Target...in general though, this is the exact reason why it's in the best interest of corporations and companies to stay out of the election part of politics. In this example, if Target donates money to a candidate or organization on "the other side" they are opening themselves up to everyone demanding that they also donate to their "side" in order not to alienate anyone.

So, while I firmly believe that there shouldn't be a law prohibiting anyone from making political donations or support (the Supreme Court struck down the laws that have been passed to try to limit and categorize who and what can and can't donate, and personally I think that any type of grouping or limiting is a violation of the first amemdment), I believe companies are smartest to stay out of this stuff, and stick to doing things based on business decisions. A good example are companies that offer domestic partner benefits to their employees - it's much easier (and to me, less discriminating) to say "we offer domestic partner benefits to our employees because we want to attract the best talent available, regardless of their race, gender, orientation, etc." vs. "we offer domestic partner benefits to our employees because we are taking a moral stand in favor of the civil rights of GLBT people". To take the position of wanting to hire the best and brightest employees, period, is as non-discriminating as you can be, and is a hard statement for anyone to argue with or be offended by.

Security and LastPass (and Yubikey)

2010-07-24T18:50:00.001-05:00

I am "behind" in terms of what I've wanted to write over the past two weeks as I have been extremely busy with, well just about everything.

But, I wanted to mentioned something I found recently related to internet password management and password security. As I have mentioned in other posts, besides being security and backup paranoid when it comes to all things computer, internet security has become somewhat of a hobby of mine. I actually hope to take a graduate program in "Network Security and Information Assurance", a program the U of M starts this year. We'll see where that fits in...

Anyway - one of the podcasts I listen to regularly is "Security Now" with Steve Gibson and Leo Laporte. I highly recommend that anyone with even a small interest in how the internet and security works listen to this weekly 1-hour show - they go into topics that are quite advanced but break them down into fairly simple pieces. Plus, every week they cover the latest in security news, what patches you should make sure to apply, etc.

Last week, they covered a password management tool called "LastPass" (http://lastpass.com). Password management for internet sites is a very difficult thing to do in this era where we all have many, many site accounts, userids, passwords, etc. Just keeping track of what sites you have userids on is hard, much less what the userid and password is. This drives many people (including myself up until now) to use the same password for many sites, sometimes all sites, which is a VERY bad thing to do - if someone gets a hold of your one password, it wouldn't take too much to start trying to hack into every account you have. I admit that I was doing this to some degree (even though I know better!) and was keeping an excel spreadsheet to keep track of everything. I kept this on a thumb drive that was physically in my possession, but that's still not a good solution (and if you don't have the thumb drive with you you're out of luck).

Lastpass solves all of these problems, and does it brilliantly and securely. From the convenience/management side of things, when you set up an account with Lastpass, they create an online database which can be accessed by signing in from any web browser anywhere. Additionally, there is a plugin for pretty much any browser or platform known to man - for me, Firefox on Windows and the Android mobile phone operating system were what I needed, but the list was huge. Once you install the plugin, and add your sites and passwords (it actually does this automatically too the first time you visit a site - more on that later), when you visit the site again, you can either have Lastpass auto-fill the userid/password fields from the database, or you can manually select "fill" when you are at the site login page if you're uncomfortable with them automatically doing it.

So, storing passwords in an online database sounds scary...let me tell you why it's not in this case. What Lastpass stores on their servers is an encrypted version of all your data - even the password to your Lastpass account is encrypted! Everything is encrypted on the client (your browser) side, with a key based on your userid and password, meaning only you can generate this key and decrypt the data that is obtained from their server or encrypt the data stored in their server. Their documentation and forums are very clear on how they do this (I read a lot of it) and several people have done independent tests and verified that they are doing what they say they're doing. What this means is, there is no way that they, or anyone, can get your stored passwords with the data stored on their servers. Only you (or someone with your Lastpass userid and password, which is only you if you're careful with it) can do anything with the data they store. Meaning that, for example, FBI could get a warrant and ask Lastpass to give them some password data from their database, and Lastpass literally could not comply - there is no technical way they could give them anything meaninful.

Now here's the kicker. All of this is free. Well almost all of it - if you want to set up your smart phone browsers to do this, there is a premium version which costs $12/year, and gives you a few more features. But most people wouldn't need to do this (I got it because I wanted to do some of their advanced stuff but that's because I'm a geek :) The premium version also gives you the option of adding a Yubikey/Yubikeys to your account. If you want to know more about what a Yubikey security key is, go to http://yubico.com/ and read about them (it's complicated and far too much to write about in a blog entry, but basically it's a second authentication factor which makes this even more secure). I have pictured the 3 I bought below - they're small USB plug-ins with one button.

For anyone who's interested, I'd be glad to show them how my Lastpass account works.

A pile of used bandaids

2010-07-20T12:14:00.000-05:00

I'm way behind in all the things I want to blog - I hope someday I can blog straight out of my brain, because a lot of my best writing ideas come when I'm not by a computer.

I really need to start reading more fiction and less history, biographies, and especially news, because, even though I find them fascinating, I also find them frustrating. (I believe I get my fascination with history and humanity from my dad...)

Today I read an article in "Time" (one of the few news magazines I find to be the most objective) about the economic situation that states are in right now, having to look at cutting all sorts of stuff. I didn't know that only the federal government is allowed to run a budget deficit, states are required by law to balance their budgets. I guess most of the time, the normal ups and downs of the economy balance each other out and usually don't cause problems. Apparently this "down" has been a lot longer and deeper than most and states are having to make what they call "real cuts" now - into services that are ingrained like education, medicaid, etc.

The situation the state governments are in sucks, and I don't really know how they're going to deal with in the very short term. But I don't understand why no one will stand up and say out loud what the truth really is about all of this. We have overinflated and artificially grew our economy for many many years (not just one president and congress, but many) and now we're going to have to pay for it. And that means if we want to continue some of these fundamental services that make our country good and strong and secure (and I'm not talking militarily secure, but secure and "sound" as a society) we are going to have to pay more taxes. Stuff costs money. We can pay less in taxes and have lesser quality of everything and have stuff run down, or we can pay more in taxes and have higher quality public services and infrastructure. It's not rocket science.

Most people probably don't want to hear that from the guy with a good job, but they should hear it from the guy that pays more in taxes as a single (at least from a tax standpoint) person in a higher tax bracket. Certainly I'd rather pay less in taxes and keep more money for myself, but if paying taxes means better education, better infrastructure, better stability, etc. then I'm willing to do it. Certainly that means our governments should spend wisely, not be wasteful, and get the most value out of our tax money as they can. But in the end, stuff still costs money.

What we seem to be doing now (getting to the explanation of the blog title) is that we keep altering laws, doing magic with budget numbers and the money supply, etc. to band-aid whatever the problem of the moment is. But we're getting to the point where all we have is a pile of used bandaids.

For example, just on the way in to work this morning I heard a commercial advertising a firm that can help you "settle" your credit card debt, and how if you have over $10,000 in credit card debt, there are government programs that can settle it for a fraction of the cost. Seriously? This is an example of another bandaid - banks get their money, and people who were irresponsible (yes, I'll say it out loud - an individual who charges up more credit card debt than they can really afford cannot just blame bad bank laws and deregulation) get set back to $0 and get to start spending more money and buying things which artificially stimulates the economy again...until somewhere down the road we have to pay for that bailout.

I realize that every situation is different, and someone who buys a house and then loses their job a few years later was not being irresponsible. But that is not everyone. I guess I've always been under the assumption that if I take out a loan for something, or charge something on a credit card, I actually have to pay for that at some point.

Why a salad costs more than a Big Mac...

2010-07-12T13:50:00.001-05:00

Thanks to my friend Christian for sharing this one:

http://contexts.org/socimages/2010/05/18/federal-subsidies-vs-nutritional-recommendations/

I've always wondered about this too - I realize that land, weather, environment dictate to some degree the types of things that can be raised in a given area, but probably not the degree of the disparity in our country.

Thursdays on First

2010-07-09T06:34:00.000-05:00

I really love that Rochester has done so much over the past few years to promote downtown and community events like "Thursdays on First". Whoever says there's nothing going on in Rochester is selling the town short. Sure there isn't a huge amount of "night life" but there are a ton of people from all walks of life out having fun at things like this.

I had the opportunity again last night to come down and jam with some other great musicians, thanks to my good friend Dan who I've known from various musical things including the salsa band. We all jammed by Sonte's for 2 hours and had a great crowd of people watching and enjoying the beautiful Minnesota summer weather. I hope we have the opportunity to do it again!

Happy 4th

2010-07-04T11:56:00.000-05:00

Not an especially nice weather day, but a fun weekend, and especially nice that it's on a Sunday and I get Monday off of work too!

We've had a fun weekend of wedding rehearsal, wedding, and a fun evening out downtown with all the friends back for the wedding.

This morning was also very cool, as for church I played "America The Beautiful" as a bell solo - the third solo I've done. It was really neat and I think everyone enjoyed it.

Hilarious Bonnie Tyler video

2010-07-04T11:48:00.000-05:00

If you never watch any of the others ones I've shared, you should watch this one - especially if you were of the era when Bonnie Tyler's "Total Eclipse of the Heart" song was hugely popular om the 80s. This video is the actual original video with "literal" lyrics put to it. I never really thought about how scattered and mindless the video actually is :)

Happy 4th everyone!

iPhone 4: If at first you don't succeed....

2010-07-02T11:01:00.001-05:00

I have to chuckle a bit when reading about this whole iPhone 4 "don't hold it wrong" antenna thing:

http://finance.yahoo.com/news/Apple-stunned-to-find-iPhones-apf-1175483258.html?x=0

Now, I actually do believe them in this case, that they're probably not doing signal strength calculations correctly - in fact I've read some more objective, credible articles about researchers having determined that on their own. But the phrase my friends and I in college used a lot still comes to mind - "If at first you don't succeed, redefine success." And as funny as that is, it happens all the time - benchmarks, performance tests, and, yes, signal strength calculations :)

Some related phrases, "Politics is perception" (from one of my all-time favorite movies, "Te American President"), and "So what I told you is true...from a certain point of view" (Obi-Wan Kenobi to Luke Skywalker in "Return of the Jedi" when he tells Luke that he wasn't actually lying when he said Darth Vader betrayed and murdered Luke's father), come to mind. Really, so much of life IS how we make it - and some (a lot?) of how we perceive things is our own choice. So if it makes us feel better to see 4 bars instead of 2, even if ABSOLUTELY NOTHING has actually changed with our signal strength, maybe that's ok? I guess one of my other favorite phrases may apply here too... "Ignorance is bliss" ... often true.

Google

2010-07-01T12:48:00.001-05:00

I like Google for a variety of reasons, but I'll add this one now:

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/38037689/ns/business-careers/
(the title is somewhat misleading...you have to read the first paragraph at least to understand it)

Weather Dodge Ball

2010-06-28T08:21:00.000-05:00

A fun and eventful weekend...Friday after work started out with me breaking my phone (cracking the screen which pretty much makes it useless since it's a touch-screen). More on that later...but Friday evening I went to a final happy hour for my good friends Brian and Jossie who are moving back to Florida. We will miss them lots, and I look forward to visiting them sometime. We were able to sit outside at Whistle Binkies for awhile before the rain/storm hit, and then found tables inside to talk, laugh, reminisce, etc.

Saturday after a leisurely morning, we headed up to St. Paul for my cousin's wedding. A very fancy affair, at one of the University buildings on Summit Ave (next door to the Governor's Mansion, so you know it was pretty nice). Again, beat the rain and storm enough to have an outdoor ceremony (the reception was of course indoors). Much talking, laughing, and catching up with friends and family.

Sunday evening was my final Notochords jazz band gig for the "season" (we start back up again in the fall). Pine Island - again, the weather just looked like it was going to be ominous, but after some cloudiness during the day and 5 minutes of hard rain (which stopped me from finishing the lawn), it actually got pretty pleasant in the evening. We had a good crowd at the band shell, 100+ people they said, and a fun evening of big band music.

A few dates of note...the important one being today, marking 4 years that Erin and I have been together. Yes, 4 years...hard to believe. Somewhere in the next week or two are also the 2-year birthdays for our kittehs (we don't know the exact dates), as well as both Erin's and my birthdays the first half of July. AND, the first week of July will mark 13 years for me at IBM. Combine that with the 4th of July and another fun wedding event this weekend and there's a lot of fun going on :)

Bionic Kitties!

2010-06-25T14:11:00.001-05:00

OK, this one is near and dear to me for so many reasons...

http://www.popsci.com/technology/article/2010-06/british-amputee-cat-first-get-bone-grafted-exoprosthetic-paws

I've seen so many cat and other pet accidents, disabilities, etc. and am always amazed at how resilient they are. The most recent story my friend Bill told me was about a cat with one leg missing that his friend adopted - the cat pretty much just dealt with it and made it work and after being around it awhile you hardly even noticed.

I'd certainly take a pet with a disability in a heartbeat. But it's cool that they can do things like this now (hopefully some of this pioneering is going on in the "people" medical field as well!)

Star Trek meets Ke$ha

2010-06-25T09:22:00.000-05:00

I have to be a little proud when my wonderful (and non-geeky) boyfriend finds things that combine our interests:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/06/21/star-trek-gets-much-neede_n_619791.html?ref=fb&src=sp

(in fairness, he DOES like Star Trek but probably not as much as I do)

Landscaping

2010-06-22T06:57:00.000-05:00

A great start to what will likely be a long, multi-year project...

From top to bottom, there is some variety of lilac (with rosemary cover), lamb's ear, parsley, wine & roses, lamb's ear, and some kind of azelia (with rosemary cover).

The weather wasn't the most cooperative yesterday, but it didn't pour so I guess that's a good thing (it cleared up about an hour after we finished of course :)

Massive Birthdays

2010-06-20T15:18:00.001-05:00

My niece is rapidly becoming famous for her over-the-top birthday parties - both activities and number of guests. Here is a picture of one of the primary attractions of this year's:

and the present I got her (if you don't get it, you need to watch the "Big Bang Theory" TV show):

A fun day!

Holy Close Calls

2010-06-20T15:12:00.000-05:00

OK, I guess I need to pay more attention to the local news occasionally. Thursday night Southern MN was hit with some very strong storms and weather. It was very windy and hard rain that I could see. I was keeping up watching the local TV station, and as the sirens went off, they were insisting that there were no tornadoes in Rochester and they assumed it was because of the high winds (70mph). Wrong I guess:

Graphic of the Tornado's Path
(and original article: http://www.crh.noaa.gov/arx/?n=jun1710)

Now...if you look at the picture, and you know where I live, I was less than half a mile away. The article said it was an EF1 on the scale, the "weakest" of tornadoes (if you can use the word "weak" and "tornado" in the same sentence). Still...kinda scary now that I know. I saw where it must have gone across 50th ave when I was driving to work the next morning, and obviously with the damage it did to the Menard's building and all the town houses in Lincolnshire, it must have been strong enough.

I guess I'll be thankful I didn't see it, and that we had no damage.

Bazinga

2010-06-15T19:55:00.000-05:00

I saw my 5-year-old niece this weekend, and one of the first things she told me was "Bazinga" - Sheldon Cooper's word from the Big Bang Theory. I couldn't have been more proud of her :)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NSqestqf63k
(CBS, HD)

and

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=skQGve3XksU
(more bazinga but lower quality)

Legal Ridiculous-ness

2010-06-10T08:54:00.000-05:00

Warning: Rant ahead...proceed with caution.

If you want to read one of many articles about what I'm going to talk about, look here: http://www.wired.com/threatlevel/2010/06/google-wifi-sniffing/ or just google "google wifi legal".

Google recently launched a project which was to help map out wi-fi hotspots and connectivity in relation to physical geographic location. They have done similar projects in the past like the "street view" many of us have seen on Google Maps (where you can type in an address and then click on Street View and actually SEE a picture of the building, street, etc.).

Well, as a consequence of how they did this wi-fi mapping project, they also collected a bunch of random wi-fi traffic. I won't go into all the technical details, but basically, if you have a wireless router, it runs in a "broadcast" mode, which means that all the traffic being sent back and forth between your laptop and the router is "out in the air" for everyone within range to see - much like a radio or TV station broadcasts their signals, but on a much smaller scale. Of course almost any modern router can be configured to encrypt this traffic, so that only the device that initiated a particular connection can decrypt its own traffic (and no one else's). Which is totally fine for the purposes of what Google was trying to accomplish - they didn't care WHAT the data being sent back and forth was, all they cared about was the unique ID of the router and mapping that to where geographically they were at when they picked up the signal.

However...not everyone configures their routers to encrypt traffic, sometimes intentionally - if you configure for encryption, you must have a password to connect to the router, and if you want a router to be an "open hotspot" like they have at coffee shops, etc. then you can't be set up for encryption. So, while Google was capturing the data it actually wanted (the router ID, etc.) it also captured bunches of random unencrypted data.

The amount of data they "collected" from any one router was 5 seconds or less.

Despite all of that, various law enforcement and legal branches of countries around the world have decided that this was not an accident, that Google must have had malicious intent, and that they should be prosecuted.

There are MANY problems with this. So here we go...

1) Google didn't do anything that ANYONE else with a wireless device can't do. Sure, they did it on a large scale, but if the owner of a router is making their router "open" by not encrypting traffic, they are assuming the risk of all their traffic being seen BY ANYONE who is in range of that router. Period. End of story.

2) Google has the LEAST motivation or anyone to use such a manpower-intensive method to try and potentially collect personal data, given that they have more data available to them than anyone on the planet with searches, gmail, etc. (yes, you should all remember that we all TRUST Google when we use all their great neat free stuff - all our "personal" data is still on THEIR servers somewhere). If they were really after the kind of data you can get doing random wi-fi captures, they have much better, easier, quicker, and cheaper ways of doing it.

3) Google has been cooperative, shown how this process works and turned over all their source code, and has followed the requests made of many countries to either given them the data collected, destroy it, etc. They don't want it, need it, and don't care if it's just destroyed.

The reason this bothers me so much is that all of this has now entered the political, corporate, etc. realm. We are spending time, energy, and resources prosecuting something that doesn't need to be prosecuted, when we don't even have a legal system that is capable of keeping up with the "real" technology bad guys out there. So since we have no laws or means of finding the people that need to be found and prosecuted, we're prosecuting the big, visible target because it's available.

The message that SHOULD be coming out of all of this is that it is YOUR responsibility to manage YOUR privacy in this networked world. If all router owners configured for encryption, this would have been a non-issue. And people need to realize that whatever they put out onto the internet, "in the cloud" is out there and is no longer completely in your control. Not only do you trust someone like Google or Facebook to keep your data private (and even then THEY have access to it should they choose to) but you also trust your ISP, phone service provider, etc. because THEY have access to everything you do, should they choose to. It is certainly in all these companies best interest to provide you with privacy but there is no guarantee of that.

You can have your opinion about how much power Google is going to wield as time goes on with how much information and data they have and control. And that should be watched. But our legal system needs to be changed or updated to handle the fast pace that our world changes.

Bad Adobe Flash plugin exploit - consider upgrading

2010-06-06T14:43:00.000-05:00

Described in this Steve Gibson article:

http://steve.grc.com/2010/06/06/adobe-flash-forward-to-v10-1/

The "official" version 10.1 will be out soon anyway, but given how much Flash is used all over the internet, you might want to consider downloading the uninstaller and install 10.1 RC7 as described - Firefox won't automatically do that if you do "check for updates" because this is still a release candidate.

Rue McClanahan

2010-06-03T15:12:00.001-05:00

The 3rd "Golden Girl" to pass away, this morning:

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20100603/ap_on_en_tv/us_obit_rue_mcclanahan_13

She was only 76, sad...

Blood Donation Ban

2010-06-03T09:09:00.000-05:00

Another article about the need to lift the ban on blood and organ donations by gay men. Besides the fact that the American Red Cross and American Blood Banks Association have long said that that the ban is scientifically and medically unwarranted (in light of better testing coupled with the fact that risk group factors among all populations are getting close to even now), this report estimates that the blood supply would increase by 1.4% and the organ donor supply would increase by 2.9% if the ban was lifted.

I know that on me alone, they lose the 8 pints a year I used to donate - I'd estimate that they've lost about 50 pints from me by now. My blood is fine, I'd gladly be donating 8 times a year.

IBM Muppets

2010-06-02T09:29:00.001-05:00

This was on slashdot this morning:

http://technologizer.com/2010/05/31/ibm-muppets/

Kinda fun that even in 1967 the company I work for had a sense of humor :)

50 Worst Inventions

2010-05-31T11:49:00.001-05:00

I don't know why I like reading these but it's fun to remember the flops throughout history...

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,1991915_1991909_1991902,00.html

Stepping off the TV "grid" - post-update (#4)

2010-05-20T10:01:00.000-05:00

Just thought DirecTV users (and maybe other services are like this too) would want to know this one.

Apparently, once your service has been terminated (and the receivers run the next nightly update), you can no longer watch any shows you had recorded on your DVR(s). I'm sure this is in their terms of service, and they explicitly make the "DVR Service" a separate line item on your bill...still, it seems kind of dumb that they wouldn't let you still watch pre-recorded shows until you have to send back the receivers. Especially given that they told me that they'd send me return boxes within 7 days and then I'd have another 7 days to return them - so at most I would have had 14 days or less.

I was kind of expecting that this might happen, and I did watch everything I really wanted to watch already, but there were a few things left on there that I probably would have watched over the weekend before resetting the receivers. I guess it's kind of surprising because now I have been left with a bad taste in my mouth, whereas yesterday I was actually quite pleased that they were very thorough and professional on the cancellation process.

Also, just as a privacy thing, it is always best to do a full reset/erase of everything on any electronic device (if possible) before returning it or sending it in - whether it be a receiver, iPod, phone, etc. so that no personal data is accidentally left on them. You only need to read Slashdot for a few days to see how important this is :)

Facebook privacy settings

2010-05-19T14:31:00.000-05:00

For people who use Facebook, you may have noticed or read that their privacy settings are getting progressively "worse" (at least by default) - they're starting to share a lot more information with third party stuff.

A general rule about anything on the internet is to know that anything you put out there has the potential to be seen by anyone, and once it's out there, it's out there and can never really be taken back. If you treat all sites that way, you'll probably stay out of trouble.

That being said, many people use Facebook a lot, and Slashdot has provided some tips and open source software links for automatically setting your privacy settings to their maximum levels.

More $-saving

2010-05-19T11:15:00.000-05:00

My good friend Shelley publishes a blog on being debt-free and money-saving, which has inspired me to think more along these lines. I'm definitely not "frugal" but I also like the idea of getting more value for what I'm spending money on.

Besides the $100/month I'll be saving without DirecTV, yesterday I added my mom's cell phone to our existing family plan. Sprint actually encourages people to do this, up to 5 phones on one account, and with our setup, everything is shared (unlimited texting, data, etc.). For my mom, it's $30/month savings from having her own account.

So something to consider - I've know some couples who pool accounts with their friends to save money and split the cost, if you can work out the details it's definitely a good cost saver.

And...this week I will be paying off my car. This is huge for me, because I've never had a paid-off car in the nearly 14 years I've been working. Because of circumstances and my affinity for buying new stuff, this car is actually my 4th in 14 years - 3 new pickups and the Saturn Vue, all of them have been new, and 2 of them have been leased. Probably not the best choice money-wise...then again, I enjoyed them a lot when I had them :)

Stepping off the TV "grid" - update #3

2010-05-19T09:13:00.000-05:00

Well, patience, when it comes to electronics and things of that nature, has never been my strong suit (I am very patient about other things, but as my parents will probably attest to, there are certain things that, once started, I have a one-track mind on).

As the last paragraph may have suggested, I cancelled my DirecTV service this morning. This was prompted by 1) using the previously described Windows Media Center setup for a couple of days, and it works perfectly (and I didn't realize how much I was missing without HD locals!) and 2) the fact that last night I figured out that Windows 7 has a built-in UPnP server and transcodes/streams the recorded TV to any UPnP capable device, not just MS Media Extenders. I think this is new with Windows 7 - Microsoft is finally figuring out it's to their advantage to interoperate with stuff (this actually makes me GLAD I have Windows for the first time in like forever). I also took a look at how much stuff was on the DVR that we will NEVER watch (we don't even have time to watch the 3 or 4 new shows we keep up with).

I still have/had no complaints or problems with DirecTV. If my hobby wasn't computers and media devices, DirecTV would still be the best choice I believe when compared with Dish, Cable, etc. But I don't think in the long run any of them will be relevant compared with the internet's media capability and flexibility.

I was a tiny bit disappointed that they didn't try harder to keep me - I have been a customer for 6 years and am the kind of customer they want. They offered to take $27 off my bill every month without even extending my contract, but that's still about $70/month, not enough to compete with "free" (yes I know it's not "free" but it's free for me given all the investment I would have made anyway in equipment and internet service).

So...at midnight tonight, I will be "disconnected" for the first time in 14 years, since college when I didn't have cable.

Am still evaluating whether or not I need to upgrade my internet connection speed. Given that I'm getting some of this off the air and not over the internet, it might not be necessary now.

Down one mower

2010-05-18T16:55:00.000-05:00

I just sold my old 11-year-old Craftsman mower that has one of the self-propel drive wheels not working, for $25. I now have $25 and more garage space...I call this a win-win :)

Madame Sparkles showed her excitement by laying on the floor and demanding petting.

Jane Lynch is awesome

2010-05-18T13:25:00.001-05:00

We all love her on "Glee" already, but I've been reading up on what she does outside of her career, and this in particular was pretty neat - I don't agree with some of PETA's methods, but the basic message here is still a good one.

Stepping off the TV "grid" - update #2

2010-05-16T22:30:00.001-05:00

(I did get outside and enjoy the wonderful weather every day this weekend, just so it doesn't sound like I spent all my time inside doing the following :)

Since my last post, I bought a Hauppauge HVR-1600 ATSC/QAM/NTSC capture card, and spoke with a friend who has been using MythTV for a couple of years, and he gave me some tips, including mythbuntu.org to get a customized Ubuntu distribution for Myth. My initial attempts at using the card with Linux were not great - after reading some forums, I tried out using some different firmware, using a modified Linux kernel, and updating some drivers. Installing the Mythbuntu distribution helped some, but I still couldn't get video that wasn't choppy and pixelated.

On Saturday though, all my plans got changed, because one of the other 5 computer's in my house (Erin's) crashed. After some quick triage, I was fairly certain I knew what the problem was - there was a generation of motherboards that had a motherboard "chip" which apparently offloaded some of the basic motherboard duties to hardware. The problem with the ones I've encountered (and read about) is that the small fans they put on these chips are very cheap and crappy and tend to go out easily. Usually, if your case has proper cooling and ventilation, you don't really need the little chip fan, but eventually something happens and the chip overheats and dies. Thus a perfectly good motherboard in all other respects is now completely worthless (thanks ASUS). Fortunately, the "spare" machine I had been doing all the MythTV messing around on had a motherboard with the same processor socket. It took a fair amount of Saturday to get everything all taken apart and put back together (including a Windows 7 re-install and all the apps) but everybody's computers are happy again. And, one of the funniest/weirdest things is that the 6-year-old motherboard/processor that I "retired" is now "un-retired" to be the backup server again...but I digress...

Back to the media stuff...I decided that without a spare computer, the next best option was to put the Hauppauge card in my super-power i7 desktop since it has more than enough power to handle recording a show and still being my desktop machine. So after cleaning up the mess from all the computer re-organizing, I put in the card and installed the software. The card definitely works better on Windows (usually the case with newer stuff). Windows Media Center did a channel scan and found all my channels, downloaded guide data, and I added all the shows I wanted to record. It says I have 43 hours of HD capacity, which should probably be good enough for now.

I tried watching from another of the Windows 7 machines and it seems to work quite easily once you add the primary machine's video directory to your media list.

A couple of downsides of using Media Center...one is that doesn't seem to let you use network drives as storage - for me that's bad because there's a lot more storage on the server. I have read about some hacks which allow you to get around this, but it seems dumb that they only allow local storage by default. Another (for me anyway) is that it seems fairly incompatible with anything else - you can use Microsoft media extenders like an XBox or other Windows machines to watch content, but it does not have a UPnP server or something that would extend universally to other clients (like my PS3).

Another advantage of having the capture card installed on my machine is that it can also take in other audio/video inputs, so I hooked it up to my VCR - I still have several tapes that I have not converted to digital, and the tapes have gotten degraded enough where some of the other methods I've tried to capture the video have not worked well. I tried one portion of a tape I know was among the oldest, and while the quality isn't perfect, it is good enough to watch - the sound and video all lined up and there was no choppiness. So I may be finally finishing that project.

Next on the list to try is Boxee - my friend Eric showed this to me on Saturday. It is a front-end TV "aggregator" of sorts - keeps track of finding content on the internet and in your media library. Does not appear to hook up directly with WMC, but has lots of other great features.

Random coolness of the day

2010-05-14T09:02:00.000-05:00

I have a lot of experience with music notation programs over the years, and I find this to be incredibly cool:

http://0xfe.blogspot.com/2010/05/music-notation-with-html5-canvas.html

Completely web-based, written in javascript, nothing to install.

Also, another much smaller coolness of the morning - all those long hours of memorizing state capitals in grade school won me $.10 off my coffee at Caribou this morning as I correctly identified the capitol of New York as Albany. :)

Stepping off the TV "grid" - update #1

2010-05-07T20:59:00.000-05:00

I thought it might be fun to document my progress in my quest for being completely off of the pay TV "grid" as described in my previous entry.

The experiment of keeping track of what we watch from the satellite is going well so far - in 7 days it's all been shows from the main networks, and all the shows are available online either on the network's own website or on Hulu. A few shows (FOX ones) are available online 8 days after they're released, but I don't know if that's a big deal given that right now we frequently watch shows weeks after they actually get broadcast.

On the hardware side, I have been researching capture cards that support ATSC (digital over-the-air) and clear QAM (unencrypted digital cable) signals. I've found there are only a couple of major brands, and will probably go with a Hauppague brand - they seem to have the best reviews, and support their products well. I was surprised to find that all cards still have NTSC analog tuners on them as well - I suppose many people still have analog cable signals. I don't really need that, and wish there were cards that just had dual-tuner ATSC so I could capture two shows at once, but the cards aren't that expensive, if I decide I need two I will just get another one.

On the software side, I spent some time after work today reading about MythTV to see if it is a viable option. It's often hard to read documentation and really get a feel for what a program does, and documentation for open source stuff is frequently out of date with the updated software, so I just installed dual-boot Ubuntu on my backup Windows machine and installed the MythTV package that comes with Ubuntu. All I can say is WOW. With a little help from the Ubuntu section of Myth's startup documentation, I was up and running in minutes. I don't actually have a capture card yet, but I was able to configure everything else and try out the user interface. Myth comes in two parts - the front end that you actually use to navigate and watch shows, and the backend which does all the heavy lifting of databasing, organizing, recording, etc. You can have one backend and as many frontends as you want that connect to it, or you can even have multiple backends to distribute the load of recording to multiple machines (in my case this won't be a heavy load of recording so one will be plenty).

But the features I was most impressed with weren't in the documentation, or were vaguely mentioned. I was worried that it would be hard to watch stuff on my Windows machines, since at best they have a partially functioning Windows front-end. As it turns out, some of the backend plugins work seamlessly with Windows Media Center software, which now comes with Windows 7. I was also concerned that my media "play-only" devices like the PS3 and the DLink media player would have no way out of the box to get to the recorded videos and that I'd have to somehow set up another UPnP server to accomplish this and have scripts to rename the files, etc. Wrong and wrong - right out of the box MythTV installs and runs its own UPnP server and has mappings for "by show", "by date", "by genre" and like 3 others. I went up and fired up the PS3 and it was all there. Awesome.

I'm having a hard time not just calling DirecTV and canceling right now :) But I will get this all working and make sure it does what I need for at least a month before I do that.

More to come...

The Worst

2010-05-05T09:50:00.001-05:00

Thanks to friend Trevor for this one:

25 Worst Tech Products of All Time

http://www.pcworld.com/article/125772-2/the_25_worst_tech_products_of_all_time.html

I would agree with most of them. I would actually rank the Sony BMG CD's as #1 - Sony has a history of blatantly thinking that they should be able to control and take over whatever device you're using their stuff on, and installing a rootkit on a PC is just plain criminal to me.