Back to it…
Diana and I had a great vacation this past week, flying out to Montana to visit with my parents and enjoy some Big Sky country. It was Allison’s first set of plane rides, so in spite of her generally calm, agreeable demeanor, I admit to being a little anxious. How would the pressure affect her little ears? How would she feel not being allowed to roam around, now that she’s used to crawling and moving around?
The morning started off at something like 4:45am. By the time we got to the airport around 5:45am or so, Allie was all smiles, looking all around and chatting it up with the world. She slept for the first portion of each flight, and sat happily in our laps for the remainder. It was really easy, thanks in large part to Diana’s preparation. We had bottles all ready to go, and lots of toys and books for instant distraction purposes. It all worked out really well.
Our time in Montana was great. We had lots of good family time with the grandparents. I snuck away one morning and played 9 holes of golf in the beautiful mountain course up there. It was awesome to have mountains on one side, and the lake on the other, with some deer frolicking in the trees. Just gorgeous. I shot a 51, which is totally average for me for 9 holes. Later in the week, Diana and I left Allie at home with my mom, and went on a float trip with my dad and another guy. Diana floated and relaxed and I fished. After about two hours of NOTHING, I caught three fish in about 10 minutes. That turned the trip around right quick. We ended up being gone for about 7 hours, which is the longest anyone has babysat Allison, and both she and my mom did great. That 7 hours comprised a full cycle (nap, lunch, awake time). Previous to this, Allison always seemed a little suspicious of my parents, so it was wonderful that they could spend some quality time together.
And now we’re back home. Our kitchen remodel continues, albeit slowly. We’re still a few weeks away from moving back home, I think, which kinda sucks.
Today is a big day for Allison. It’s her 10 month birthday, as well as her first official day of daycare at Dorrie’s! Dorrie is a nice lady who runs a day care from her home (and has been doing this as her chosen career for the past 25 years or something). So far, we’re pretty impressed with her. Since this is a tough age with regard to separation anxiety, Dorrie suggested that Diana start coming over for lunches and doing some acclimatization, which has been going on for the past couple weeks. Today, Diana dropped off Allie at 8:30am, and picked her back up at 12:30pm. I just got a message that everything went really well, with only a few minutes of crying before naptime (which is totally normal). So, that sounds really good. She’ll continue to do half-days for a couple days this week, then do a couple full-time days next week, and then start full time as Diana and I go back to work.
Now that I type that, I realize was a big change that’s going to be for everyone. I’m used to being apart from Allison during the days, obviously, but it’s going to be huge for both her and Diana. I mean, I always knew that it was coming, but it’s just kind of sinking in. As I said, we’re pretty pleased with what we’ve seen at Dorries. The children are really well behaved, and she treats them with respect and politeness. I hope it lives up to my expectations.
Speaking of expectations, I went out with some boys to see the new Batman movie. Long story short, I thought it was really good. It started at 10pm, and we left the theater at like 12:45am, so I was a little sleepy, and afraid I might have missed some of the subtleties, so I’m looking forward to a second viewing. I thought that Heath Ledger’s Joker completely stole the show. All the buzz you’ve heard about him is well deserved.
And finally, we have a new pet! Diana caught a stick bug! And by “caught”, I mean “found it on her foot”, and by “stick bug”, I mean “baby stick bug”. The thing is about half an inch long. But I put him in the requisite jar with holes in the lid, along with some sticks (natch) and grass and a piece of spinach. I’ve named him “Pointy”. I hope he does well. It’s always fun to look in the jar and try to find him.
That’s all, blog. Smell you later.
2008/07/21
2008/06/27
Science and Skepticism
In my own mind, I’ve really cemented position as a Skeptic.
I used to consider myself a skeptic, but with a relatively open mind towards the possibility of spirituality, faith, and belief. I mean, there are billions of people in the world who believe irrational things. Even very smart people. But after reading and pondering, I just can’t figure out why.
I recently read Richard Dawkins letter to his daughter, titled “Good and Bad Reasons For Believing”. Go read this now. We’ll wait. To sum up, the good reason to believe in something is “evidence”. The bad reasons are “tradition”, “authority”, and “revelation”. He expands on each of these topics, of course.
I then read an excerpt from Carl Sagan’s book “The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”. The excerpt is called “The Dragon in my Garage.” You should read this, too. Soon after reading this, I purchased the book itself, and I started reading it last night. It really got my mind racing.
Also, here's a small web movie which touches on the subject of what science is. (Skip to 25:10 or so for a really nice description of how clinical trials work). It’s long, but well worth watching.
Each of these attempt to teach us laypeople exactly what Science is. The authors clearly feel that the general public is scientifically illiterate. Given our collective penchant for UFO stories, psychics, ghost sightings, crystal healing, and all manner of pseudoscience, I’m afraid I’m inclined to agree.
In my own opinion, the problem with scientific illiteracy is that it makes Science appear to be “just another religion”. Those who don’t understand basic science are forced to take it on faith alone. For example: we hear scientists say that humans and apes evolved from common ancestors (or, and I cringe when I hear it, that we “evolved from apes”) millions of years ago. On Sundays, though, our pastor tells us that we were created from a divine source in the same form as we are today. Some people think this happened as recently as 6000 years ago. Both the pastor and the scientist are pretty emphatic that they are right. In fact, they both can cite lots of important sounding resources that confirm their belief, and also make pretty convincing arguments why the other guy is wrong.
So we’re left in the lurch. Who should we believe, and why?
The best option would be to do all the research on our own, and see all the evidence with our own eyes. But obviously, we can’t all be experts in paleontology and biology, as well as fluent in ancient languages. So, somehow, we need to decide. Do we believe the scientist or the pastor?
Sagan points out a difference between science and religion. My paraphrasing is: science wants to be wrong, and religion wants to be right.
So here’s how science works. We observe the world around us, and see that weird stuff happens. We notice, for a stupid example, that water turns into ice when it gets cold, and turns back to liquid when it warms up. Why does this happen, we wonder? So we take water into the laboratory, and do tests. Over and over again, we find that water always freezes at 32 degrees. In fact, the tests we do aren’t to try to make water freeze. The tests we do try to make water NOT freeze at 32 degrees. But no matter what we try, water always behaves the same way.
What a great discovery! We publish our results and crack open the champagne.
Now here is the CRITICAL part: A fellow scientist in the French alps reads our paper. He’s also been working on the water freezing problem, and has found that water freezes at a slightly different temperature at a high altitude. Another scientist tries seawater, and finds that he comes up with different results as well. So we all go back to the lab and try more tests, until we come up with a good working model of how water freezes, noting that salinity and altitude make a difference. And once we get that model, we publish it, and let others beat on it, looking for holes. And even when it seems to stand up to rigor, we still keep testing it, just in case. We want it to be wrong. In fact, I’ll bet that proving that our current concept of why water freezes is wrong would win you a Nobel Prize.
Another example. Does anyone remember the Cold Fusion discovery in the 80’s? Two guys thought they had unlocked the secret to cheap and abundant energy, and published their results. It was all over the news for a while, until other people tried to duplicate their claims, and couldn’t. That is the scientific community at work. Everything is transparent and open-source.
A couple years ago, my dad had an article published in the New England Journal of Medicine. I didn’t realize it at the time, but soon after it became pretty clear that this was a big deal. Being a proud son, I read the article. I couldn’t understand much of it. My memory was that the conclusion of the article was basically “our tests indicate a minor trend toward such-and-such. More testing is required.” I remember thinking “That’s it?” We talked about it, and it became more clear that that’s how it works: Science isn’t sweeping discoveries. Science is adding to the accumulated body of knowledge in very small, verifiable steps. It’s slow and steady, but it is reliable and repeatable.
And Science is pragmatic. It works. If praying or faith healing or holding a crystal to my forehead reliably cured migraines, I’d do that instead of 50mg of Imotrex.
I’m certainly not an expert in religions, but they don’t appear to have the same sense of inward scrutiny and need for self-validation.
I think I’ve always been a skeptic, but now I’m making it official. And my first official pronouncement as a Skeptic: that I’m skeptical of my own skepticism! Are there things that I believe on faith alone? What do I believe in that can’t be tested or verified? And, to be fair, have I really given crystal therapy for migraines a fair shot?
I used to consider myself a skeptic, but with a relatively open mind towards the possibility of spirituality, faith, and belief. I mean, there are billions of people in the world who believe irrational things. Even very smart people. But after reading and pondering, I just can’t figure out why.
I recently read Richard Dawkins letter to his daughter, titled “Good and Bad Reasons For Believing”. Go read this now. We’ll wait. To sum up, the good reason to believe in something is “evidence”. The bad reasons are “tradition”, “authority”, and “revelation”. He expands on each of these topics, of course.
I then read an excerpt from Carl Sagan’s book “The Demon Haunted World: Science as a Candle in the Dark”. The excerpt is called “The Dragon in my Garage.” You should read this, too. Soon after reading this, I purchased the book itself, and I started reading it last night. It really got my mind racing.
Also, here's a small web movie which touches on the subject of what science is. (Skip to 25:10 or so for a really nice description of how clinical trials work). It’s long, but well worth watching.
Each of these attempt to teach us laypeople exactly what Science is. The authors clearly feel that the general public is scientifically illiterate. Given our collective penchant for UFO stories, psychics, ghost sightings, crystal healing, and all manner of pseudoscience, I’m afraid I’m inclined to agree.
In my own opinion, the problem with scientific illiteracy is that it makes Science appear to be “just another religion”. Those who don’t understand basic science are forced to take it on faith alone. For example: we hear scientists say that humans and apes evolved from common ancestors (or, and I cringe when I hear it, that we “evolved from apes”) millions of years ago. On Sundays, though, our pastor tells us that we were created from a divine source in the same form as we are today. Some people think this happened as recently as 6000 years ago. Both the pastor and the scientist are pretty emphatic that they are right. In fact, they both can cite lots of important sounding resources that confirm their belief, and also make pretty convincing arguments why the other guy is wrong.
So we’re left in the lurch. Who should we believe, and why?
The best option would be to do all the research on our own, and see all the evidence with our own eyes. But obviously, we can’t all be experts in paleontology and biology, as well as fluent in ancient languages. So, somehow, we need to decide. Do we believe the scientist or the pastor?
Sagan points out a difference between science and religion. My paraphrasing is: science wants to be wrong, and religion wants to be right.
So here’s how science works. We observe the world around us, and see that weird stuff happens. We notice, for a stupid example, that water turns into ice when it gets cold, and turns back to liquid when it warms up. Why does this happen, we wonder? So we take water into the laboratory, and do tests. Over and over again, we find that water always freezes at 32 degrees. In fact, the tests we do aren’t to try to make water freeze. The tests we do try to make water NOT freeze at 32 degrees. But no matter what we try, water always behaves the same way.
What a great discovery! We publish our results and crack open the champagne.
Now here is the CRITICAL part: A fellow scientist in the French alps reads our paper. He’s also been working on the water freezing problem, and has found that water freezes at a slightly different temperature at a high altitude. Another scientist tries seawater, and finds that he comes up with different results as well. So we all go back to the lab and try more tests, until we come up with a good working model of how water freezes, noting that salinity and altitude make a difference. And once we get that model, we publish it, and let others beat on it, looking for holes. And even when it seems to stand up to rigor, we still keep testing it, just in case. We want it to be wrong. In fact, I’ll bet that proving that our current concept of why water freezes is wrong would win you a Nobel Prize.
Another example. Does anyone remember the Cold Fusion discovery in the 80’s? Two guys thought they had unlocked the secret to cheap and abundant energy, and published their results. It was all over the news for a while, until other people tried to duplicate their claims, and couldn’t. That is the scientific community at work. Everything is transparent and open-source.
A couple years ago, my dad had an article published in the New England Journal of Medicine. I didn’t realize it at the time, but soon after it became pretty clear that this was a big deal. Being a proud son, I read the article. I couldn’t understand much of it. My memory was that the conclusion of the article was basically “our tests indicate a minor trend toward such-and-such. More testing is required.” I remember thinking “That’s it?” We talked about it, and it became more clear that that’s how it works: Science isn’t sweeping discoveries. Science is adding to the accumulated body of knowledge in very small, verifiable steps. It’s slow and steady, but it is reliable and repeatable.
And Science is pragmatic. It works. If praying or faith healing or holding a crystal to my forehead reliably cured migraines, I’d do that instead of 50mg of Imotrex.
I’m certainly not an expert in religions, but they don’t appear to have the same sense of inward scrutiny and need for self-validation.
I think I’ve always been a skeptic, but now I’m making it official. And my first official pronouncement as a Skeptic: that I’m skeptical of my own skepticism! Are there things that I believe on faith alone? What do I believe in that can’t be tested or verified? And, to be fair, have I really given crystal therapy for migraines a fair shot?
2008/06/25
Quick Hits
Allison is becoming more and more interactive every day. She definitely understands about a dozen words (that we know of). If you put some toys in front of her, and ask her where the ball is, she’ll look around and grab it. She knows Mommy and Daddy. I recently taught her to clap, and when we sing a song that involves clapping, she’ll clap at the right part. Babies clapping? Pretty damn cute. If I ask her for a kiss, and I’m very lucky, she’ll lean forward and open her mouth and stick her tongue out a little, presenting it to be kissed. It’s a little… intimate, but it’s extremely cute. She’s crawling around everywhere now, and likes to pull herself up to standing and bang on things on the coffee table, and walk around holding on to our fingers. It’s so crazy to think that she’s becoming her own little person, and will soon be walking and talking.
We went to the Fair yesterday, and she seemed to enjoy the animals. I wanted to walk through the fun zone, and Diana checked on Allie in her stroller, and she was full lip-out pouting/crying. Bad father. It was pretty loud and scary back there, so we left pretty quick. Some of the rides are crazy, and it kind of amazes me that I used to go on ‘em.
When we got home, I took some aspirin for a headache, and soon after my eye swelled up. I’m finally putting a connection together between aspirin (and ibuprofen) and my eye swelling up. I don’t take headache medicine very often, and the reaction doesn’t always happen (or perhaps is delayed), but I think I’m pretty convinced that I should avoid those types of drugs. Apparently Tylenol is ok, so I’ll try that for a while.
Work is going well. Not too much else to report.
2008/06/18
Arcade Game Memories
Something has made itself clear in my mind recently, and that is that I have extremely distinct memories of what coin-op arcade games I played as a kid, and exactly where I played them. Even though the Yellow Brick Road arcade no longer exists, I could probably still go stand in the exact spot where Virtua Fighter was.
During a particularly slow day at work, I started compiling a list. I approached it from two directions… first I thought of my stomping grounds, and remembered what games were there. Then I started thinking of random video games, and trying to place where I’d played them. This list is pretty much off the top of my head.
Safeway: I’d come here with my mom. While she shopped, I’d watch the video game demos, and if I was clever enough to bring a quarter from home (or steal one from her car), I’d play a game.
Beef Shoppe:
Bellasarios:
7-11 was a great hangout on the way to and from school
Bioys and Girls Club:
Yellow Brick Road: A classic, classic arcade. I mourned the day that it was turned into more food court.
Best-a-Wan Pizza
Surf and Turf. I remember we went here for Scott Hall’s birthday party one year, and his dad handed out platic baggies with quarters in them.
What’s a little scary to me is that this isn’t just a list. Each of these is pretty much a distinct memory. As I write this, I can think of more (the Family Fun Center, the FunSpot arcade in New Hampsire, the Del Mar Fair (beating Golden Axe with Iwan)). I have no idea how or why these have stuck so firmly in my head, but there they are.
Phew. It feels good to get those aired out a little...
During a particularly slow day at work, I started compiling a list. I approached it from two directions… first I thought of my stomping grounds, and remembered what games were there. Then I started thinking of random video games, and trying to place where I’d played them. This list is pretty much off the top of my head.
Safeway: I’d come here with my mom. While she shopped, I’d watch the video game demos, and if I was clever enough to bring a quarter from home (or steal one from her car), I’d play a game.
- Asteroids (I remember finding a quarter and putting it into the machine, only to find that the single player button was missing, so I couldn’t start the game. Later, some kid (who had the button) was playing my game. I think my mom explained that it was my quarter, and the kid moved aside and let me play. I’m pretty sure I couldn’t see much of the screen).
- Slalom skiing (don’t remember the exact name)
- Pool game (ditto)
- Alien Syndrome
- Yie-Ar Kung Fu
- Jungle Hunt
- Q*Bert
- Punch Out
- Spy Hunter
Beef Shoppe:
- Karate Champ
Bellasarios:
- Bubble Bobble (noteably, played this with NBA player Scot Pollard in junior high school)
- Raiden II
- One of those 4-in-1 NeoGeo things that I never liked or played
7-11 was a great hangout on the way to and from school
- Gauntlet (I remember playing this with a guy who was later caught as a serial rapist)
- Street Fighter 2 (I spit Slurpee all over the machine when Jon Yarris called Chun-Li “Chin-Lu” (not really that funny now, I guess))
- Black Tiger (great game)
- Moon Patrol
- Shinobi
- Bad Dudes (I think Iwan and I beat this together)
- Double Dragon
- Donkey Kong Jr.
- Elevator Action
- Some “Wild West” game
- Ninja Gaiden
Bioys and Girls Club:
- Pengo
- Gravitar (both games only 5 cents!)
Yellow Brick Road: A classic, classic arcade. I mourned the day that it was turned into more food court.
- Virtua Fighter 4
- Tron
- Star Wars
- Red Baron
- Battlezone
- Street Fighter 2 (Mike Stup would frequently school me on this game at Flower Hill... even when he'd play the big russian wrestler guy and I'd play Blanca)
- Pole Position
- Popeye
- Kangaroo
- Front Line (I liked this game)
- Pit Fighter
- Marble Madness
- Rampage
- Xevious
- Time Pilot
- Track and Field (I remember playing this on a skiing trip with Joel Brown. It was in a little rec room where the Jacuzzi was. One of us did the “run” buttons while the other did the “jump” button. That worked pretty well)
- Marble Madness
- Rampage
- Gauntlet II
Best-a-Wan Pizza
- Vanguard (This game came out in 1981. I was 6 years old)
Surf and Turf. I remember we went here for Scott Hall’s birthday party one year, and his dad handed out platic baggies with quarters in them.
- Jackal
- Front Line
- Ikari Warriors
- Dig Dug
What’s a little scary to me is that this isn’t just a list. Each of these is pretty much a distinct memory. As I write this, I can think of more (the Family Fun Center, the FunSpot arcade in New Hampsire, the Del Mar Fair (beating Golden Axe with Iwan)). I have no idea how or why these have stuck so firmly in my head, but there they are.
Phew. It feels good to get those aired out a little...
2008/06/15
Indiana Jones
Diana and I saw the latest Indiana Jones movie as a little fathers day getaway. I had exceedingly low expectations, but what was I going to do, NOT see it?
It was pretty bad. From the VERY first shot (the gopher nearly getting hit by the car), I had a bad feeling. It just got worse from there, culminating in classic digital vomit on the screen in the climax. Seriously, the single rolling ball in the beginning of Raiders was far more exciting and realistic than 10,000 physically accurate computer generated crashing rocks. And where the hell did all those monkeys come from?
The only silver lining is that little Shia Le Boef (or whatever) did a halfway decent job. If the reins are handed off to him, I guess it could be worse.
Ugh. Diana probably summed it up best after we left: "My soul needs a shower".
It was pretty bad. From the VERY first shot (the gopher nearly getting hit by the car), I had a bad feeling. It just got worse from there, culminating in classic digital vomit on the screen in the climax. Seriously, the single rolling ball in the beginning of Raiders was far more exciting and realistic than 10,000 physically accurate computer generated crashing rocks. And where the hell did all those monkeys come from?
The only silver lining is that little Shia Le Boef (or whatever) did a halfway decent job. If the reins are handed off to him, I guess it could be worse.
Ugh. Diana probably summed it up best after we left: "My soul needs a shower".
2008/06/11
Sugar and Spice
It was when Diana was still pregnant that the idea of raising a girl and the gender issues that may follow hit home.
I remember visiting a bookstore. I was in the magazine section, and there was a mother and her little girl (three or four years old) looking at magazines. While the mom was looking at some magazine on the top shelf, the girl was looking at the covers of the magazines at her eye level. Those magazines were fashion magazines like “Elle” and “Vogue” and whatever other magazines feature airbrushed models in high fashion clothes. We’ve all heard the concept about “the media” telling out little girls how they are supposed to look, but in that one moment, it really kind of hit home. And it wasn’t even my own daughter!
It’s been interesting to observe the kind of comments Allison gets. Some of my friends have young boys, and there have been good-natured jokes about potential future relationships. We get many comments about her looks, even from strangers on the street. I tell her how cute she is all the time.
I never thought much of it before, but as time passes, I can’t help but wonder what the cumulative effect of those comments might be. I realize it’s WAY to early to be starting to worry about this kind of thing, but by the same token, I’m surprised at how early people wonder who her first boyfriend will be, or how she’ll look in a bikini.
I don’t really know where I’m going with this. Is it bad to comment that she’s cute? No, absolutely not. I just want to make sure she’s on the right course from the start, as it seems far easier to do that than to try to make major course corrections later on. And I guess I’m afraid that potentially years of constantly hearing “You look so pretty in that dress!” could get her on a course which I don’t think is the best.
But on the other hand, seriously, what the hell do I know about any of this? Someone help me out, here…
I remember visiting a bookstore. I was in the magazine section, and there was a mother and her little girl (three or four years old) looking at magazines. While the mom was looking at some magazine on the top shelf, the girl was looking at the covers of the magazines at her eye level. Those magazines were fashion magazines like “Elle” and “Vogue” and whatever other magazines feature airbrushed models in high fashion clothes. We’ve all heard the concept about “the media” telling out little girls how they are supposed to look, but in that one moment, it really kind of hit home. And it wasn’t even my own daughter!
It’s been interesting to observe the kind of comments Allison gets. Some of my friends have young boys, and there have been good-natured jokes about potential future relationships. We get many comments about her looks, even from strangers on the street. I tell her how cute she is all the time.
I never thought much of it before, but as time passes, I can’t help but wonder what the cumulative effect of those comments might be. I realize it’s WAY to early to be starting to worry about this kind of thing, but by the same token, I’m surprised at how early people wonder who her first boyfriend will be, or how she’ll look in a bikini.
I don’t really know where I’m going with this. Is it bad to comment that she’s cute? No, absolutely not. I just want to make sure she’s on the right course from the start, as it seems far easier to do that than to try to make major course corrections later on. And I guess I’m afraid that potentially years of constantly hearing “You look so pretty in that dress!” could get her on a course which I don’t think is the best.
But on the other hand, seriously, what the hell do I know about any of this? Someone help me out, here…
2008/06/08
Under Control
So things are going pretty well.
At work, we just went live with our new Trading system. As I said, this is a big deal project, spanning over two years, involving updates to several applications, a couple new applications, and all the back-end glue that lets the systems interact with each other (the Order Generation program needs to talk to the Trading program, which in turn needs to output stuff to the back end Accounting system). As with any software, there were (and certainly still are) some bugs. In a Trading system, the worst kind of bug comes when orders are generated that shouldn't have been. We might buy the wrong thing, or sell too much of something. When those trade errors happen, we correct the problem so that the client gets whatever they should have gotten, and eat any costs. In the first week of our big project, I understand that there was something like $100 in trade errors. This is huge. Trade errors can easily be tens of thousands. So, things are going pretty well, and it feels good.
I also mentioned that Dr. Dave and his family were here for a week, and that was a lot of fun. One thing I realized while playing with Ben was how much we use our imagination as a child, and how little we use it as adults. Ben and I spent a while on the airplane (our big chair). He had on my gaming headset (with microphone), and we'd have to talk to the tower to request permission to take off and land, as well as instruct the flight attendants to start handing out Oreos and milk (and sometimes "chiiickennnn feeeeeet...") I was a bit worried about how all our schedules would interact (naps, etc), but there weren't any problems at all.
Allison has made some pretty big strides lately. Up until recently, we'd still swaddle her for bedtime, because if we didn't, she'd bonk herself in the face and wake herself up. She was also waking up multiple times in the night, and each time required about 20 minutes of holding and comforting to get her back to sleep, followed by the dread of trying to put her down in bed without waking her up, and sneaking out of her room. Sometimes that was followed by getting back into bed, only to have her wake up 5 minutes later.
After doing some reading, and thinking about how we wanted things to work, we decided that she needed to learn that her crib was a place for sleeping, and that she should be able to wake up and put herself back to sleep. So for a few nights, when she'd wake up, we'd let her cry a bit instead of immediately rushing in to pick her up. And it didn't take a whole lot of time before she got the picture. Now when she wakes up in the night, she'll cry for a few minutes, and go right back to sleep. And last night, as far as we can tell, she was asleep at 6:30pm and slept through to 7am. This is a good trend.
What's a little scary is that she's becoming mobile. She'll now frequently go from sitting to all-fours, and can kind of inchworm or half-crawl across the floor. It's slow and effortful, but I'm pretty sure she'll be cruising in a week or two. Time to buy childproof cabinet locks and outlet protectors! The problem with crawling is once she gets to where she wants to go, she doesn't really know what to do, and is left stomach-down and unhappy. The maneuver to get from all-fours back to sitting will be a big step.
Another big development is that we're having our kitchen redone, and since my parents are in Montanny for a while, we've moved into their Del Mar pad. The 7 minute commute is pretty awesome.
So, that's about the latest news. With all of the above, things have been pretty hectic for the last couple (months), but I'm hoping we're back into a good groove.
Some quick movie hits:
I third-wheeled with Iwan and Sara to see "Iron Man", and thought it was pretty decent. Worth seeing. That's probably as high-praise as you'll get from me for a summer blockbuster superhero movie.
Diana and I independatly saw "LA Confidential" when it came out, and neither of us remembered it, or felt like we "got it" the first time around, so we Netflix'd it and watched it last night. I really liked it, and not sure why I didn't the first time I saw it. Maybe it's got an intricate enough plot that if you don't pay close attention, it's easy to get lost.
I still have Indy Jones on my list to see. I'm not particularly looking forward to it, but what am I going to do, not see it?
At work, we just went live with our new Trading system. As I said, this is a big deal project, spanning over two years, involving updates to several applications, a couple new applications, and all the back-end glue that lets the systems interact with each other (the Order Generation program needs to talk to the Trading program, which in turn needs to output stuff to the back end Accounting system). As with any software, there were (and certainly still are) some bugs. In a Trading system, the worst kind of bug comes when orders are generated that shouldn't have been. We might buy the wrong thing, or sell too much of something. When those trade errors happen, we correct the problem so that the client gets whatever they should have gotten, and eat any costs. In the first week of our big project, I understand that there was something like $100 in trade errors. This is huge. Trade errors can easily be tens of thousands. So, things are going pretty well, and it feels good.
I also mentioned that Dr. Dave and his family were here for a week, and that was a lot of fun. One thing I realized while playing with Ben was how much we use our imagination as a child, and how little we use it as adults. Ben and I spent a while on the airplane (our big chair). He had on my gaming headset (with microphone), and we'd have to talk to the tower to request permission to take off and land, as well as instruct the flight attendants to start handing out Oreos and milk (and sometimes "chiiickennnn feeeeeet...") I was a bit worried about how all our schedules would interact (naps, etc), but there weren't any problems at all.
Allison has made some pretty big strides lately. Up until recently, we'd still swaddle her for bedtime, because if we didn't, she'd bonk herself in the face and wake herself up. She was also waking up multiple times in the night, and each time required about 20 minutes of holding and comforting to get her back to sleep, followed by the dread of trying to put her down in bed without waking her up, and sneaking out of her room. Sometimes that was followed by getting back into bed, only to have her wake up 5 minutes later.
After doing some reading, and thinking about how we wanted things to work, we decided that she needed to learn that her crib was a place for sleeping, and that she should be able to wake up and put herself back to sleep. So for a few nights, when she'd wake up, we'd let her cry a bit instead of immediately rushing in to pick her up. And it didn't take a whole lot of time before she got the picture. Now when she wakes up in the night, she'll cry for a few minutes, and go right back to sleep. And last night, as far as we can tell, she was asleep at 6:30pm and slept through to 7am. This is a good trend.
What's a little scary is that she's becoming mobile. She'll now frequently go from sitting to all-fours, and can kind of inchworm or half-crawl across the floor. It's slow and effortful, but I'm pretty sure she'll be cruising in a week or two. Time to buy childproof cabinet locks and outlet protectors! The problem with crawling is once she gets to where she wants to go, she doesn't really know what to do, and is left stomach-down and unhappy. The maneuver to get from all-fours back to sitting will be a big step.
Another big development is that we're having our kitchen redone, and since my parents are in Montanny for a while, we've moved into their Del Mar pad. The 7 minute commute is pretty awesome.
So, that's about the latest news. With all of the above, things have been pretty hectic for the last couple (months), but I'm hoping we're back into a good groove.
Some quick movie hits:
I third-wheeled with Iwan and Sara to see "Iron Man", and thought it was pretty decent. Worth seeing. That's probably as high-praise as you'll get from me for a summer blockbuster superhero movie.
Diana and I independatly saw "LA Confidential" when it came out, and neither of us remembered it, or felt like we "got it" the first time around, so we Netflix'd it and watched it last night. I really liked it, and not sure why I didn't the first time I saw it. Maybe it's got an intricate enough plot that if you don't pay close attention, it's easy to get lost.
I still have Indy Jones on my list to see. I'm not particularly looking forward to it, but what am I going to do, not see it?
2008/06/03
Fires
Our big project at work rolled into production on Monday.
I was definitely heavily involved in it before Allie was born, so that’s over 8 months ago, and as a developer, we join the game after requirements have been gathered and analysis and design has been done (so, halfway through the course of the project).
So it’s been about a 2 year deal, and it’s pretty huge that we’re live. Today and yesterday were spent stamping out little fires as they popped up, but so far there hasn’t been any Big Issues.
Crazy.
In other news, I had last week off while Dr. Dave and his family were in town. It was great to see them, and especially to see little nephew Ben as a real live little boy. Lots to tell, but another work fire just popped up.
More later.
I was definitely heavily involved in it before Allie was born, so that’s over 8 months ago, and as a developer, we join the game after requirements have been gathered and analysis and design has been done (so, halfway through the course of the project).
So it’s been about a 2 year deal, and it’s pretty huge that we’re live. Today and yesterday were spent stamping out little fires as they popped up, but so far there hasn’t been any Big Issues.
Crazy.
In other news, I had last week off while Dr. Dave and his family were in town. It was great to see them, and especially to see little nephew Ben as a real live little boy. Lots to tell, but another work fire just popped up.
More later.
2008/05/13
Social Networking
As I’ve probably mentioned on here before, I’m the king of nostalgia. I feel like I can remember my pre-college years, all the way back through elementary school, so clearly. I love looking through old class photos, and seeing old friends and acquaintances and wondering what they’re up to now. Occasionally, some random person will get on my mind, and it will be sort of a challenge for me to find them and see what they’re up to, and in rare cases actually email them and say “hey”.
Combine this, however, with my distaste for social networking, and you’ve got kind of a weird mix, I think.
I sat next to Liz last night at a dinner celebration for Baditude’s birthday. She found it PRET-ty hilarious that I denied a friend request from an elementary school classmate that I haven’t talked to in, say, 20 years. I don’t know if anyone on the planet has ever denied a friend request, judging by her reaction. I tried to explain that the term “friend” holds a certain meaning for me, and I’m sorry, there’s no way I can justify having that person on my “friend’s list. Mike Stup’s sister, likewise, issued a “friend request” to me. What? I did a magic show at her 9th birthday, I think, but since then I’m pretty sure I haven’t had a conscious thought about her. And now she wants to be friends? I’m sorry, but that’s just a little weird to me. No disrespect to little Mal, I’m sure she’s wonderful and that we’d be bff’s someday. But we need to work on our relationship a little bit to get to that point.
The only reason I have a thrice-damned MySpace and Facebook account is to spy on people anyways.
My theory on MySpace is that chicks like to hang out there. They like it because they like to post messages to each other, and use the cutesy li’l graphics like this:
And the only reason guys are on there is, well, ‘cause that’s where all the chicks are hanging out. Someone tell me if I’m wrong.
Facebook seems a bit more adult, but I’m still not quite sure what the point is. And it’s far too closed off for a snoop like me to get anywhere. It has those wacky plug-in applications, but I don’t particularly like that those applications are granted access to your personal data. That’s smells way too fishy for me.
In the end, social networking, for me personally, feels like a solution looking for a problem. I’m not looking to meet people, and I don’t feel like I have a problem staying in touch and having fun with friends… What am I missing?
This didn’t mean to turn into a rant. Oh well. :)
In other news, life is good. Little Allie is my absolute pride and joy. My favorite time of the day is coming home from work and her looking up and seeing me come in the door and giving me a huge smile. Melts my heart every time. She’s at a really fun age right now, where she’s interactive, but manageable, and not out of control or totally headstrong and willful. Her newest hobbies included shaking her head back and forth (as if she’s say “NoooOOOoooOOo!”), banging things together to make noise, and making strange guttural noises. Good times.
Combine this, however, with my distaste for social networking, and you’ve got kind of a weird mix, I think.
I sat next to Liz last night at a dinner celebration for Baditude’s birthday. She found it PRET-ty hilarious that I denied a friend request from an elementary school classmate that I haven’t talked to in, say, 20 years. I don’t know if anyone on the planet has ever denied a friend request, judging by her reaction. I tried to explain that the term “friend” holds a certain meaning for me, and I’m sorry, there’s no way I can justify having that person on my “friend’s list. Mike Stup’s sister, likewise, issued a “friend request” to me. What? I did a magic show at her 9th birthday, I think, but since then I’m pretty sure I haven’t had a conscious thought about her. And now she wants to be friends? I’m sorry, but that’s just a little weird to me. No disrespect to little Mal, I’m sure she’s wonderful and that we’d be bff’s someday. But we need to work on our relationship a little bit to get to that point.
The only reason I have a thrice-damned MySpace and Facebook account is to spy on people anyways.
My theory on MySpace is that chicks like to hang out there. They like it because they like to post messages to each other, and use the cutesy li’l graphics like this:
And the only reason guys are on there is, well, ‘cause that’s where all the chicks are hanging out. Someone tell me if I’m wrong.
Facebook seems a bit more adult, but I’m still not quite sure what the point is. And it’s far too closed off for a snoop like me to get anywhere. It has those wacky plug-in applications, but I don’t particularly like that those applications are granted access to your personal data. That’s smells way too fishy for me.
In the end, social networking, for me personally, feels like a solution looking for a problem. I’m not looking to meet people, and I don’t feel like I have a problem staying in touch and having fun with friends… What am I missing?
This didn’t mean to turn into a rant. Oh well. :)
In other news, life is good. Little Allie is my absolute pride and joy. My favorite time of the day is coming home from work and her looking up and seeing me come in the door and giving me a huge smile. Melts my heart every time. She’s at a really fun age right now, where she’s interactive, but manageable, and not out of control or totally headstrong and willful. Her newest hobbies included shaking her head back and forth (as if she’s say “NoooOOOoooOOo!”), banging things together to make noise, and making strange guttural noises. Good times.
2008/05/05
Grand Theft Auto IV
I bought Grand Theft Auto IV the day it came out.
I honestly wasn’t planning on buying it right away. I knew Baditude was going to pick I up, and I figured I’d let him check it out and see if it was worth it. But then I heard reports on the radio about how huge it was going to be, and read a couple of reviews that were all in the 10/10 or A+ range, and figured I wanted to be a part of it. 70% of my decision was for the game in general. 25% was that I thought the multiplayer aspect of the game sounded really neat, and 5% of it was I wanted to support Rock Star Games, and a cause that I believe in.
When I mentioned this to a workboy, he said (a touch incredulously) “What cause is that?”
“Freedom of artistic expression,” I shot back coolly. (Well, maybe not that coolly, but I meant it).
The unfortunate thing about GTAIV is that there’s simply no way for the two sides to communicate with each other. People who haven’t played the game hear reports on the news that the game generally involves murder and mayhem. There’s drinking and driving and sex and drugs and violence. Not only that, but there’s a huge amount of freedom built into the game, so the player can make some really obscene choices. A popular example is that you can hire a prostitute, drive to a dark alley and conduct your business, and then when she gets out of the car, you can run her down and take your money back. Stuff like that. The game doesn’t direct you to do this, or specifically reward you for it, it just creates a world where those choices are available.
But as I said, there’s simply no way for people who have played the game to communicate with those who have only heard about it. You read the above and are shocked, but we have ALL seen or read fictional depictions of equally depraved acts. I guess it’s the interactive nature of the game that makes it different from passively reading a book or watching a movie. I actually believe that the two are closer than most people think. When a gamer is controlling someone on the screen, it’s not “me”, it’s “him” or “my guy”. We’re in control, but we’re still primarily observers of what goes on. I think non-gamers overestimate exactly how much we gamers actually personally identify with our on-screen persona.
The second major source of confusion is that people still associate the word “game” with “children”. This needs to be addressed somehow. GTA is about as appropriate for children as the movie “The Departed” is – which is to say, not at all. (You remember “The Departed”, right? Oscar winning movie where the whole second half of the movie is people getting shot in the face, but no one blinked an eye about it?) When I bought the game from my local GameStop, I asked the drone if there were any problems with kids trying to buy the game. “We don’t sell it to kids”, he immediately responded. He even went on to say that if a kid did somehow manage to drag his mom into the shop to buy the game for him, they still wouldn’t sell it. So, kudos to that guy. A popular news story on GTA release day was that someone in London was stabbed in a line that had formed of people waiting to pick up the game. This kind of muck-racking journalism really pisses me off. I have to believe that people are stabbed and shot in all kinds of lines all the time (not to mention concerts, nightclubs, etc). Some journalist obviously said “quick, find some associate of real-world violence and this game!” and that’s the best they could come up with.
Another news story going around is that MADD is unhappy with the game because it features drinking and driving.
"Drunk driving is not a game, and it is not a joke," MADD said in a statement released Tuesday. "Drunk driving is a choice, a violent crime and it is also 100 percent preventable."
As the victim of a drunk driving accident, I couldn’t agree more. But it’s clear they never actually saw the game.
I was just playing GTA this weekend. Niko was bumping around Liberty City when his cell phone went off. It was crazy cousin Roman. “Nico, let’s go out and have some fun!” he said. So I (of course, not “I”, but Niko) picked him up and we went to a local bar. Soon after, we were standing on the sidewalk, weaving all over the place. The camera was panning around all over, and it was really hard to walk around. A little message box popped up, and said something along the lines of “You’re pretty drunk. You shouldn’t drive in this condition. Consider walking it off or getting a taxi.” Definitely something pretty strongly worded like that.
Of course, I decided to drive. Why?
I once heard a game developer define fun as “learning in a consequence-free environment”. That quote really stuck with me. Things that I think are fun are always about learning in some respect or another. If there isn’t any learning involved, then it’s just a task (no one plays tic-tac-toe once they’ve figured it out, right?) And “consequence-free” is obviously important. Given the opportunity, I’d love to get drunk and try driving a car if I was guaranteed (magically) that would be absolutely no consequences. I think part of the problem of drunk-driving is that we have no idea what .08 feels like, and can’t judge our own impairment.
So, Niko and Roman hopped in the car and we tried driving a couple blocks back to the taxi depot. The camera was blurry and panning around wildly, and the car seemed to steer on it’s own accord, and I was careening into oncoming traffic and rubbing against parked cars trying to go in a straight line. The car was a wreck, and I ran a couple people over, but we eventually made it back (real-life Adman feeling a little sick to his stomach after all the camera movement).
I couldn’t help but think that some sort of modified version of that exact sequence would be the best anti-drunk driving education ever. GIVE kids a computer game (in Health class or something) that simulates being drunk in the same way (blurry, weaving camera controlling a semi-autonomous car). Let them learn in a safe environment (fun!) about how hard it is to drive drunk. Keep a dollar tally of how much damage you cause, and how many pedestrians you killed. I have to think that that would teach so much more than watching some 1960’s filmstrip about drinking and driving. Anyways, I really think MADD screwed up, and just is trying to ride some coattails.
All that said, I’ve been really enjoying it. I read a review that lauded the choice of using Russian/Eastern European mafia as a theme, saying that it was the only crime culture left that had not yet been glamorized by Hollywood. I thought that was pretty insightful. I feel like I’ve just scratched the surface, but so far it’s been great.
And remember that line about “learning in a consequence-free environment”, and let me know if it makes as much sense to you as it does to me.
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