Thank You "Angry Asian"!

I know that I already sent you an e-mail expressing my thanks for the stuffed animals that you made and sent to my kids, but I thought I would follow up with a blog posting since I saw that you had the animals featured on your blog.

My kids  (well, my girls anyway)  saw the pictures on your blog and reported back to me, "Our animals are famous!  Their picture is on the computer!"

First there's Zack.  I picked the horse for him, before his sisters had a chance to pick out any of them for themselves.  He's one boy among lots of girls, so I have to look out for him.  :-)  I tried getting a better shot of him with the horse, but he was having too much fun grabbing it and slinging it down to the floor.  Unfortunately, he hasn't taken to it.  He's got lots of toys, and has focused on other things that make more noise when they hit the floor.  Fortunately, though, that means that he's giving the horse every chance to survive, and keep from getting sent to the glue factory.  Or at least the recycled fluff factory.

Next, Ella.  I think she was next to pick an animal, but only because she was home and the older two had not returned from school, yet.  As you can see, she loves the pink pig.  What you can't see is that the pink pig now has a cape on it.  I think it fits quite nicely, and is a welcome addition to the pig's wardrobe.  The pig thinks so, too.

I don't recall at the moment if any of the animals have gained names, yet.  I'll have to write you back  to let you know if I find out.

Now for Emmie.  She chose the monkey.  The picture on the left was taken at the bus stop one morning.  Emmie can take a "friend" with her to school for nap time, and I think the monkey has accompanied her each day since his (her?) arrival.  Some of the stitching on one, maybe both, of the arms is coming loose--I think I can sew it back up if I can ever get the monkey off her back.  Ok, sorry, bad pun.  But you know what I mean.

I don't have a picture of my oldest with the cat.  But if you would,  imagine that there is a picture of the most beautiful 9-year-old girl here with a big smile on her face, similar to Emmie's or Ella's, or Zack's for that matter, holding the stuffed cat.  Truth be told, that's a bit contrived--she's more into her American Girl Doll at the moment, but did think it was cool to see pictures on the famous animals on your blog.

And for any of my two other readers of this blog, the story I'm referring to (if you've made it this far) can be found here.

Phun is, well, Fun!

I first heard about Phun a couple of weeks ago, but finally downloaded and installed it a couple of days ago.  Be warned, it is addictive!

I have barely started learning what all it is capable of modeling, but already have created a scene (not the one pictured--that one actually comes as part of the download) with an incline, rolling ball, a platform with a spring, and a few other things.

It's phun to watch thing "come alive" once you click the play button.  Sometimes you get unintended effects, like once when I didn't balance a large ramp that I drew freehand.  It ended up falling over, when in fact I was expecting the ball I placed on top to roll down its side.  (That was easily fixed by "fixing" it in place with one of the controls from the toolbox.)

From reading the web site (link is above) it appears that there is a lot of work planned for this free download.

Take my word for it, download it and start having phun!

Birds (but no Bees)

These birds have built a nest in a pot we have on our side door for the past several years. Actually, they may have been absent last year, but they're back this year. If you can tell me what kind they are, please do. Oh, and I say "birds", but you only see one in the video (shot with my phone). They take turns--the other one hangs out by the deck railing. I guess he (or she) is the lookout. Anyway, here goes:

This was the third video I shot in a span of about 5 minutes. I stood very still on the inside of the door. In the other two videos you see mostly pot but no bird. As they say, third time's a charm. I guess the bird got a little used to me by this time.

What a Good Friday it Is

...if for no other reason than I actually got to drive the speed limit (or greater!) on my way in to work this morning.

LICE SUCK!

My wife called me toward the end of my work day a couple of days ago to tell me that my oldest daughter came home with lice.

First, let me say that I have never had lice.  Nor has anyone in my family, that I know of.  Yes, there is a stigma about lice--people seem to think that if you have lice then you are a dirty person or at least have poor hygiene habits.  That is not the case in our house.  My wife is super-anal about keeping not only the house but the kids, too, clean.  And I mean eat-off-the-floor clean!

So when I heard that my oldest daughter had lice, I was floored!

We're not sure where they came from, though we had just bought some clothes from a consignment sale and the girls were trying them on before they had a chance to get washed.  That's my guess...no telling who had the clothes before the sale.

Of course, school is another option.  So is the YMCA.  The kids spend a lot of time in both places.

Anyway, we'll probably never know where they came from.

But now that people have heard that we've had lice in our house, there are the stories about how long it has taken people to get rid of them.  Hopefully we were extreme enough to prevent them from coming back:

• Everything, and I mean everything, that has material/is soft in all of the kids' rooms was bagged, awaiting a deep cleaning by our new washing machine (which has a "Sanitize" setting).
• All rugs were rolled up and put in the garage.
• Lice spray was sprayed everywhere (mattresses, carpet, rugs, and so on).
• Lice-killing hair cream was applied (before we read about all the dangers of this product).
• Lice combs were used.
• Vaseline was applied to the hair to smother anything that survived the cream.
• Tons of Joy disk liquid and Gojo cream was later applied to try to get the Vaseline out!
• Pillow cases and sheets were slept in once before being bagged (to be cleaned by said new washer).

Luckily, I escaped un-infected.  Somehow.  I know that the girls get in my bed while I'm showering in the morning before we all head down for breakfast on school/work days, so I'm surprised that I didn't pick up one or more from that!

Anyway, I just wanted to vent that LICE SUCK!  And they are expensive, too!  The chemicals we've bought has set us back $150 or more.  We also chose this time to replace our existing washer and dryer.  Our washer was fine, except that it had lost a few screws and as a result it rattled like crazy during spin cycles.  Our dryer was on its last legs, however, and was in desperate need or replacing (and had been for months!).  So we got the front loading ones.

No, we technically didn't buy them because of the lice,  but we thought it would be a good idea to go ahead and replace them now, since we were planning on it anyway.  Thankfully we had the money to do so, too.

Long story short: I'll never think poorly of people who have lice again.  It can (and does) happen to anyone!

Salem Lake

I hinted a while back that I needed to post about Salem Lake, near Winston Salem, North Carolina.  It was at this lake that I did many of my training runs for the Chickamauga Marathon, which I ran last November.

What can I say?  I pretty much fell in love with the 7-mile dirt and crushed-gravel path which surrounds the lake.  I would leave work around 4:30 or 5, change clothes, and then head over to the lake, which was about a 10 minute drive from the office.

The trail has a few hills, but for the most part is flat.  The hardest part is by the dam, where you go from 10 - 15 feet above lake level to about 10 - 15 below lake level and then back up to 15 or so feet above lake level again!  And with the direction I ran (counter-clockwise) this was always at the end of the run.

The lake trail is also connected to a green-way, which if you ran from the parking lot at the head of the green-way to the lake and back is 9 miles, if I recall correctly.  I ran this a couple of times by itself, and I also ran it a couple of times including the loop around the lake.  Yes, it was dark by the time I finished, and part of that run goes through some, well, less-desirable areas of Winston Salem.  Let's just say I had my phone with me, just in case.

This is what the actual path looks like.  What looks like tire tracks actually are...cyclists use the path too, and they tend to "keep to the right" as you would expect on a highway.

It got to the point where I would recognize several of the people on bikes.  Several of the joggers and walkers, too.  It really is a very popular place for the fitness-oriented folks in the area.

Every so often there are park benches.  I'm not quite sure that they get used--I personally never saw anyone sitting any of the times that I was there running.  One bench in particular, though, caught my attention.  It had a small plaque attached, which had the following inscription:

Brenton Hiroshi Stovall
June 7, 1988 - May 3, 2007
His beat goes on...

Obviously, this was to memorialize a young man who died.  I did some Googling to see what I could find out about him, and discovered that he died in a car wreck while running an errand.  I'm not sure how long these links will last, but I'll include some links here to some news stories:

• Winston-Salem Journal
• A neighbor's personal blog
  (scroll to the entry at "Friday, 11 May 2007")

Very sad, indeed!

Overall, I attribute my personal success in the Chickamauga Marathon last November to my training here at Salem Lake.  If I'm ever back in the area, I'm brining my running shoes (even though I'm not actively training for anything at the moment).

Water-Free Potties

This is pretty cool.  The office building I'm in has installed urinals in the men's bathrooms which do not use water.  It has taken some getting used to...

The urinals are made by Sloan, using Falcon Waterfree technology, and the ones installed in this building look like this:

Notice anything different?  For one, there are no water pipes!  If any women readers of this blog picked that out, then I'll question how you knew!  :-)

If you'll look closely, you'll notice a small spec above the ring at the bottom.  A close-up view is to the right.  Yes, it is a bee.

My first day here, I was instructed that I was supposed to "aim for the bee", to which I replied (though only to myself), "Poor bee!"

Like I said, it has taken some getting used to.  I'm fairly accustomed to the sound or rushing water when I step away from a urinal, assuming, of course, that it is equipped with an automatic flusher.  The silence after stepping away from one of these is, well, a little foreign to me.

I have no clue what the return on an investment like this would be.  Granted, a lot less water is used each day in this building, which is cool, so there is the main cost savings.  I don't know what the maintenance cost is like on one of these, but I'll assume that it is less than the cost of flushing water down the drain...

Windows Live Writer

Yikes!  Two posts back-to-back--what is this world coming to?

I just wanted to post a short note to let you know that I switched over to using "Windows Live Writer" to write my posts for this blog.  The first entry I published using Windows Live Writer was the last one (Moving Day), but I have one in the works, saved as a draft, about Salem Lake.  I mentioned a while back that I needed to write an entry about it, and it's in the works, though it's not progressing very rapidly.  I'll publish it one day soon, promise!

Moving Day!

No, we're not changing addresses.  However, I have officially moved into my new office in the basement as of Saturday!  There are still a few things that need tidying up--the main things being covers for all of the outlets and light switches.  But the office is in a state now where it can be used.

My thanks go out to my good friend Darren for his help (and his hand-truck) on Saturday moving the monster that is my desk.  THANKS DARREN!  My arms are still a little sore today (Monday--two days later!).

I also (finally) rearranged the new cable/phone modem and wireless router down in the utility room so that they are off the floor.  Eventually I'd like to get a nice enclosure to contain all the wiring endpoints--a patch panel of sorts--so that I can more easily configure which network outlets are active.  As for now, I still have a mess of cables in the utility room.  And I use the term "mess" in its technical definition.  :-)

Anyway, as a result of switching over to using the cable modem provided by Comcast (which came into our house after they decided to end their old phone service and we went with their Digital Voice phone service), I now have a spare cable modem.  Anyone out there want to buy a relatively new (~18 months old) Linksys cable modem?  I can provide a model number if you need it.  Make me an offer!

Basement is Nearly Finished

I had a day to work from home on my current project, and I actually worked a day in the basement for the first time! Granted, it was at our old kitchen table which is down there now, and not in my new office (the desk is still in the master bedroom), but the basement is pretty much usable now. Here's what's missing, in no particular order:

• Door knobs
• Lots of light bulbs, though I had one over the table to use (!)
• Toilet
• Bathroom vanity
• Network hookup (I had a great connection to my wireless router a couple floors up, though)
• Cable hookup
• Phone hookup (again--wireless to the rescue!)
• Wet bar (water lines and drain line are in place--no sink or counter, yet)
• Blinds (only need one for the office and one for the door--no other windows down there, thus the need for all those light bulbs!)

Let's see...that's about it for this phase. Later we'll convert the room Melissa calls the "Playroom" into what I call the "Theater". Much later, though...need to have kids which won't destroy the expensive electronics I'm planning for that room. In the meantime we may install a disco ball, just for fun! Must post pictures someday...I'm bad about that, even though my initial purpose for starting this blog was to "see how Picasa and Hello interact". I haven't used "Hello" for some time, especially since Blogger made it so easy to upload pictures directly to the blog. Happy 2008!

Drought Saying of the Day

As you may have heard on the news (I know if you've watched the Weather Channel they've mentioned this, and I know that the Weather Channel is national--except for Los Angeles where the weather never changes), we're in the middle of a severe drought in the Southeast. The governor of Georgia called for a mandated 10% reduction of water usage, and we recently got a letter from Fulton County (the county we live in, and the supplier of our drinking water) that if they couldn't acheive the 10% reduction through voluntary measures then they would financially penalize the people who were not achieving the 10% reduction. So we're doing our part--the kids take baths in much less water than they used to, and then we save the water to use on the plants (both inside and outside). But the best thing I've heard for saving water is a saying that I heard my mother-in-law say:

If it's yellow, let it mellow, If it's brown, flush it down!

I laughed out loud when I heard that one! I'm not sure where she heard it, so I can't give the appropriate attribution, so if any of my 3 regular blog readers know, please tell me!

Did it Again: Marathon Man Times 2

Sorry for the lack of blogging--like it says at the top of the screen, I'm fairly terse. That translates into, "I dont' blog a lot." So for the two people whom I know check in on this blog on occasion, let me just say, "Hey Cat and Wally!" Yeah, you know who you are. Of course, it didn't hurt that I named you. :-)

Anyway, the big news of the evening, actually of the week or month, is that I completed my second marathon, the Chickamauga Battlefield Marathon (sponsored by the Chattanooga Track Club), last Saturday. It was held at, you guessed it, Chickamauga Battlefield National Military Park.

I shaved a full 29 minutes off my previous time back in April (though I didn't blog about it until nearly a month later in May). New marathon record time (for me) is 4:14:24. Yes, that's in hours, minutes, and seconds. That's a lot of running at one time!

Here's the official score for the three of us from the Chattanooga Track Club's site:

MALE AGE GROUP: 35 - 39
Place	O'all	Name	Age	City,St	5mi	Half	2ndhalf	Chiptime	Time
=====	=====	=====================	===	====================	=======	===========	===========	=======	=======
40	230	Steven Jackson	38	Milton GA	49:26	2:07:56.10	2:06:27.75	4:14:24	4:14:36
41	235	Darren Chambers	38	Alpharetta GA	49:27	2:07:57.25	2:09:02.35	4:17:00	4:17:12
58	367	Mark Hildebrandt	35	Alpharetta GA	49:38	2:13:37.20	2:48:40.00	5:02:18	5:02:29

Melissa even brought the kids up the morning of the race, and they made it there in time to see me cross the finish line! That was cool. I had my cell phone with me during the race so I could call and touch base with her while she drove, and again while she was finding her way through the park to the finish line. They got there when I was at about mile 23--just in time!

Here's the breakdown, mile for mile:

Mile	Time	Cumulative Time
1:	9:37	9:37
2:	9:59	19:37
3:	10:02	29:39
4:	9:58	39:37
5:	9:48	49:26
6:	9:30	58:57
7:	10:15	1:09:12
8:	9:44	1:18:56
9:	9:14	1:28:11
10:	8:59	1:37:10
11:	10:17	1:47:27
12:	9:42	1:57:10
13:	9:37	2:06:47
14:	9:44	2:16:32
15:	9:45	2:26:17
16:	10:02	2:36:20
17:	9:32	2:45:53
18:	9:16	2:55:09
19:	9:33	3:04:43
20:	9:40	3:14:23
21:	10:18	3:24:42
22:	10:23	3:35:05
23:	9:43	3:44:49
24:	9:45	3:54:34
25:	9:44	4:04:18
26:	8:19	4:12:38
(Finish) 26.2:	1:46	4:14:24

I'm actually feeling great after this one, unlike the previous marathon. I remember reading in my post from May that my knees hurt for days afterward, but this time around, it was only my thighs which were sore, and only for about a day.

We've already signed up for the Thanksgiving Day Half Marathon, as well.

Darren jokingly asked (at least I think he was joking) if I wanted to do the full marathon on Thanksgiving day, and I just said, "No" right away. But in thinking about it, it would make sense, since we're already in shape to run it. But we're just doing the half marathon--don't want to feel bad (i.e sore) the rest of Turkey Day!

While I've been traveling to Winston Salem, North Carolina, on business, I've been training for this race at Salem Lake. I have a blog post in my head about that place. Hopefully I'll get it written soon... stay tuned.

[Update: I can't do math any more...I shaved off 29 minutes from my first marathon time, not 19 as I had originally stated. The time has been updated above. -Steve]

Blogger Play

This was posted on Blogger's "dashboard" page: Blogger Play. It's a more-or-less real-time slideshow of images that people from all over the world are uploading to Blogger currently. Disclaimer: I won't be held responsible for the lack of work that you get done because you're watching random images instead of doing what you're supposed to be doing!

Strange Sight in Winston-Salem

I've been traveling on business to Winston-Salem, North Carolina, for the past, oh I don't remember, number of weeks. Well, a couple weeks ago I noticed that some crews were out marking up the streets--evidently getting ready for some sort of road-tearing-up-and-then-making-better project. Now this is not a doctored image--this really exists on Broad Street in Winston-Salem, North Carolina, in the good ol' USA: Yes, that is a manhole cover in the middle of the road. And I'm supposed to keep it closed. I'm fine with that--they're usually pretty heavy, and I'm usually wearing my business casual attire while walking by, so I'm apt to leave it alone. Leave me a comment with your ideas of why they felt the need to write this in the middle of the road!

"You Know You've Been Traveling too Long When..."

You know that you've been traveling too long when you no longer feel the same thrill with taking the shampoo, conditioner, and soap that the hotel gives you. I'm leaving it at the hotel this week! [Still in Winston-Salem, NC.]

On The Road Again

Just like nearly 3 years ago, 7 weeks after my child is born I'm traveling again for business. Last time, after Ella was born, I traveled to Houston on a project. This time I'm in Winston Salem, North Carolina. Not much else to say, other than I'm glad I'm working inside. It has been in the high 90's the past few days here! Oh, and this week's rental car is a Lincoln Towncar. I could get used to it!

Careful What You Wish For!

I was just going back over some older posts. I really should be careful about what I write on this site... "That much closer to being a diaper-free family." Ha! As it stands, Ella only wears a diaper at night now, but Zack goes through them like they're going out of style!

Emmie's Poem

The other day, Madeline and Emmie were trying to remember one of their favorite poems from a book that my mom has. The poem is called, "I Went to the Store", and it was written by Jack Prelustsky. This whimsical poem is about a person who goes to the store and gets all sorts of things that he didn't go there for. Here are the opening lines:

I went to the store for a pear and a plum. The fruit was all gone, so they sold me a drum.

The rest of the poem is similar, and like I said, the girls love it.

Well, the girls couldn't remember the poem, so Emmie offered this one:

I went to the store to buy some more. When I got home, I found out I was poor.

Pretty cute and creative, if you ask me!

Kidding Around

The other week, I was joking with Emmie when she was whining, "Whaaat's for diiiner?". With a smirk on my face, I said, "Food." Emmie whined again, "What kiiind of fooood?" Without missing a beat, Ella replied, "Meat." I think Ella is going to be a comedian when she grows up.

Peachtree Road Race

I ran my first ever Peachtree Road Race, which is touted as the world's largest 10K. It started out as a great day for a run, with low humidity and temperatures, but I had a number that a neighbor gave to me which was in the 80,000 range, which meant that I didn't actually cross the starting line until 1:05:00 after the race officially started. Yes, that's ONE HOUR and FIVE MINUTES. That meant that it was starting to get pretty warm by the time my race began.

Here is where I lined up (in front of Phipps Plaza)--you can't even see the starting line (which is front of Lenox Square Mall):

In this shot, we're getting close to the starting line:

I felt like since I was in starting group 8 that I would be surrounded by a bunch of walkers, or at least a bunch of slower runners, so I managed to work my way to the front of the pack. Once they said, "Go!" a bunch of people sprinted ahead of me, thus debunking my theory.

I used my new watch that I was given for Father's Day, which has a chronograph with 100 lap memory. Each mile was fairly clearly marked with a big sign, and when I saw "Mile 1" I looked at my watch to see what my time was. I was in disbelief: it read 7:54. I was running a sub-8-minute-mile! I had been training at a 10 minute mile pace, so dropping that down by over 2 minutes per mile meant that I was cruising! It helped that the first 3 miles were either level or downhill, too! At mile two, I remembered that I could use use the "split" feature of my watch to record each mile's cumulative time. Here's the breakdown for the race:

• Mile 1: 7:54 (estimated)
• Mile 2: 15:53 (7:59 mile)
• Mile 3: 24:33 (8:40 mile)
• Mile 4: 33:33 (9:00 mile)
• Mile 5: 43:07 (9:34 mile)
• Mile 6: 52:30 (9:23 mile)
• Finish (6.2 miles): 54:28

As I passed Peachtree Battle Shopping Center, where the restaurant "Jalisco's" is, I called my mom on my cell phone. We always like eating there, so I was reminded of her as I jogged past. I could only talk for a minute or two, because just past there is the start of "Cardiac Hill" (or is it "Heartattack Hill"?). I was headed uphill, started breathing heavily, and said goodbye to mom. I slowed way down going up that hill. Partly because the people in front of me all slowed down, and the walkers weren't keeping to the right like they were supposed to. But mostly because I was hot, I was running uphill, and I had already run 3 miles in 24 minutes: I was tired! Getting to the top wasn't too bad--it seemed like a fairly short hill, plus there was water along the way. Then the course leveled out for a little bit to get to the bridge over I-85, then went up a little more. People were handing out ice along the way, which felt great. There was a lot of sun at this point in the race, and it was getting hot! After getting past the High Museum, the course started to level out and then go back down hill. I picked up my pace again, especially when I could see 10th Street ahead. Around the corner would be the finish line, though I wasn't certain just how far around the corner it would be. It was a little farther than expected, but I kept up my pace as best as I could. The street was very crowded at this point! I called home after passing the mile 6 sign and was on the phone with Madeline as I crossed the finish line. I think she got a kick out of that. Can't wait until she can run it with me (she's got to be at least 10 to run the full race).

Here's a shot in Piedmont Park of all the finishers and other spectators: It was a great day for a run!

[Updated on 7/12/07 with pictures!]