Coming clean

For those of you who have visited us here in California you know that although there is a bathroom in our guest room there is no shower. This forces guests who want to be clean (and that is most of you I believe) to walk downstairs to the shower on the first floor.

Well I am happy to say that after taking care of item #145295-A from my "honey do" list there is now a shower available on the 3rd floor. In a successful 1 day project I installed a new faucet, shower head and shower curtain in the third floor bathroom. I will admit it is "Euro style" in that because of the slope of the roof in the bathroom it is a bit lower than normal so people my height "6'2" in the morning" as they say will need to bend slightly to wash your head. But still that beats walking all the way down stairs with all of your bathroom stuff.

So, now that we have removed that as a potential objection we expect a flood of guest to come and try out the new facilities!

"It's a you and me day Nick!"

That's what I heard Lea say to Nicolas this morning. Awwww.

It is great when an older sister feels like hanging out and Lea, when she wants to be, can be really really great with Nicolas. In fact they have been playing all morning quite nicely. I was compelled to bring them some of the fresh muffins I made up to Lea's room so that they could have breakfast in bed which was a nice treat.

It is all so sweet that it reminds me of hanging out with my sister, like the time I dragged her down the stairs locked in a suitcase! Awwww, isn't that sweet. Not.

Why ME?

When we purchased our first laptop as a couple in 2000, a simple Dell Inspiron 8000 , there weren't many choices of operating systems for it and memory at the time was very expensive. In fact if I recall correctly we had no choice and ended up with the Windows Millennium Edition (ME) OS which was a consumer focused very limited operating system that Microsoft stopped supporting in 2006. When we got it we lived in Paris and initially used it for all email and web surfing using a DIAL UP modem but ultimately got a high-speed cable modem (thankfully).

It was the first computer Julia ever used where she played simple educational s/w and I think is one of the reasons she learned to read so early. I would install the updates that came from Dell and Microsoft regularly but never upgraded the OS due to time and cost. Occasionally it would start to slow down and I would have to perform maintenance to get it back to a usable state before Melissa would kill me because it was one of her primary modes of communicating with folks back in the US.

When we moved back to the US we purchased another computer and the little laptop fell somewhat into disuse. Then when Lea became of age there was suddenly contention for using the computer so I resurrected the little computer that could and found that it could still adequately run most of the educational software we had for the kids. This meant that two at a time could go. The down side was that as I loaded more s/w it would again get crippled due to too much in the registry and too much on the disk.

More than once I had to perform major surgery in order to get the little computer back to life. With kids banging away on it who knows what actually would happen, I would jest get a "the computer isn't working" error code from the regular users and would have to go in and debug it myself. It was after several of these episodes that I began to appreciate a feature of Windows ME which is backup points. At some regular frequency the OS establishes a recovery point in time where it takes a snapshot of the system. When the system becomes corrupted, as has happened many times now, you can simple step back in time to a happier place where things work. As I have said I have used this many times.

Another time the disk had become so fragmented (the little pieces of information were so scattered the computer couldn't efficiently read them) that I had to de-fragment it for 4 DAYS!

But alas after that process the "little OS that could" came right back up.

Now mostly used by Nicolas the computer has seen a whole new level of abuse. To begin with he peeled off about half of the keys on the keyboard. I was able to replace all but about 5 of the keys. Unfortunately some of the missing keys involve the passwords to some of the games he likes to play so I had to hook up an external keyboard, which mostly sits on the ground getting stepped on when it is not needed.

Also, his version of "shutting down" the computer involves holding the power button down until it turns off. This is VERY hard on the little computer (CD drive no longer works too) and recently when I tried to start it it told me there was "no registry file" which is the file that tells the computer where all the software is, so that was obviously a problem. Hello January 15th restore point!

I am not sure if any of the other operating systems that MSFT produces have this feature but they should. I am sure they never designed ME to live for 10+ years with no updates or upgrades while getting hammered on by 3 kids.

So in this case only I say hats off to Microsoft and the little OS that could.

How big is a cubit?

It has been raining cats and dogs around here for more than a week. I've seen all the rivers and creeks up near the tops of their levies with muddy fast flowing water and lots of debris.

So I've decided to start building an ark for me, Melissa, the kids, our two pet beetles, and our 15+ stick bugs (no exact count available). Of course any friends or family who are in town are welcome to join us.

I heard this morning that we have gone from being down on the seasonal rainfall total by more than 25% for the year to up by more than 25% in the span of a week. Now you have to keep in mind that the seasonal total at this time is about 9 inches but still!

So, given what is going on does anyone know how big a cubit is?

I might be addicted to...

a tank game we have for the Nintendo Wii we have. So far I would say it hasn't adversely affected anything (I am not choosing the game over food or sleep YET) but I certainly like to play.

The tank game itself is one of several on our Wii Play game. The game itself is really quite simple in that you control a tank from a top down view (not even a fancy first person game) and try to eliminate the other tanks controlled by the game. The levels of course get progressively more challenging because of both more challenging layouts of the game and because the tanks you must eliminate become better, faster and more well armed than your tank.

One of the good but annoying things about the game is that the shells you shoot (and anyone else for that matter) will bounce off the walls of the playing arena 1 time. This means that you can accidentally shoot yourself if you are not careful.

I am not sure why this game is so addictive to me. I think maybe it takes me back to some of the games I played as a kid except the levels are more interesting and of course it has the Wii style interface with the motion capture/trigger combo.

At this point the kids will sit on the couch and cheer me on because I am able to go so much further than they can (unlike many of the other Wii games where they are much better than me). Maybe that is it, maybe I need my own little area of the Wii where I can be the best?

Who knows, either way hopefully Melissa won't have to send me to rehab. Now back to the game. :-)

Funny work video

We have an bi-annual meeting called a kickoff where the entire company gets together to synch up on issues and to do some planning for the rest of the year. During this meeting we have an internal video contest for the funniest / most compelling/ best video from our internal teams.
Anyone can enter from an individual to a group of people.

This January there were many outstanding entries but the winner (of the $1000 cash prize) was a particularly clever video that highlighted one of our well know industry experts in XML.

Click on this URL to see the video. All of the people in the video are employees except for the woman.

http://greenllama.com/index.php?option=com_content&catid=7&id=12&lang=en&view=article

Aloha

I work hard, some say too hard, but I am dedicated to my job and it has provided well for me and my family over the last 3 years. The company is pretty good about recognizing performance and as an enterprise software company each year they award top sales people with an annual trip to someplace nice. This trip is called quota club and usually is a 3 night all expense paid trip. The company provides the trip not only for the sales person but also their significant other. There are a few company related activities but mostly it is fun, good food and recognition for a job well done.

Last year for example they went to the Ritz Hotel in Whistler B.C. Canada for some skiing.

The company also selects a few employees from outside of the sales organization who were deemed to have a significant and meaningful contribution to the company over the last year.

Well this year I have been selected to attend quota club and I am of course honored and very excited! Club this year will be at the very exclusive Ritz-Carlton Kapalua Take a look at this hotel online,(you can see pictures by clicking here) it is an amazing property in a beautiful location. Many people actually take their kids (but find ways to spend time as a couple) and Melissa and I think we will bring them along on this wonderful trip.

Aloha indeed!

Pending battle

It is a classic make vs. female household conflict. One uses it up and one uses it down. Some say it is a matter of convenience, others say it is a matter of courtesy. Debates and disagreements over this issue have nearly felled empires and changed the course of history.

What am I referring to? Why of course the toilet seat. :)

After spending some time trying to get Nicolas to lift the toilet seat when he uses the bathroom we are now working with him to lower it back down when he is done. I think all of the females here have fallen victim to a post Nicolas toilet seat, some with more outrage than others.

Now of course we have tried and tried to remind him that in addition to putting the seat up and washing his hands he also needs to put the seat down. Of course I am somewhat sympathetic to him on this issue but have long ago given up on the issue.

I am sure that over the long run he will eventually start putting it down, let's just hope it isn't a long and protracted battle.

Great Game, Great Friends, Great Time

Hey I returned early yesterday from Pasadena where was attending the BCS national championship game at the Rose Bowl between Alabama and Texas. Unfortunately the game did not turn out as I expected in large part because the starting quarterback Colt McCoy got injured on the 5th offensive play. Texas lost 37 to 21 but the game was actually much closer and much much more exciting than the score tells.

After Colt went out an untested freshman Garret Gilbert had to come in and try to lead the team to victory, and he almost did cutting a 24 to 6 halftime lead to 24 to 21 with the ball and more than three minutes on the clock in the 4th quarter. By this stage my voice was almost completely gone from yelling! My head actually hurt from whistling as much as I was. Unfortunately for the horns the Bama defense stepped up and caused a turnover and that was it.
I went with my pals Richard and David Moxley and a friend from work JT (Jason Tidwell). All in all I still had a blast, we attended the Texas tailgate party, ate some good food, drank a few beers and screamed our heads off trying to urge our Horns to victory.

Richard posted pictures we took with his camera. Also in the pictures are his parents who are Bama fans and I am guessing much more satisfied with the outcome of the game.

You can't quite get a sense of the atmosphere before and during the game from the photos but I heard someone describe it as electric and I would have to agree. If you ever have a chance to go to a game like this you should, it is worth the money.

Hook em Horns!

The entire gallery is here on this link:

http://mox.smugmug.com/Other/Texas-vs-Alabama-Jan-2010/10893675_w9YFJ/1/760409645_ZYV2v

Some selected photos here below

Something happening here...

What it is ain't exactly clear.. to quote the old Buffalo Springfield song, but actually it is clear.

There has been quite a bit of kerfuffle here in the Rivermark neighborhood lately regarding the local elementary school Don Callejon. The main issue has been that the school is overcrowded with kids and basically bursting at the seems and the local school board has been wrestling with some unpopular options for resolving the issue.

There is a huge influx of younger kids (including ours) which is going through the school that will cause it to exceed it's maximum capacity this year or next and because the students are all young that problem will go on for quite some time.

As an example in Julia's grade (4th) there are just 2.5 classes but in Lea's grade (2nd) there are 5 classes and in Nicolas' grade (kindergarten) there are 6!! The grade school (the school is k-8 where the middle school is in a separate building on campus) has already had to put grade school kids into the middle school building because of the "bubble" of lower grades coming through. All demographic indications are that there will continue to be more years of 6 kinder classes which will further strain the resources at the school. Another example of the strain is that on rainy days (fortunately rare around here) there is basically not enough room at the cafeteria for all of the kids to eat inside. Normally they utilize outdoor seating for lunch which generally works when the weather is nice.

So the Santa Clara Unified School District (SCUSD) now has a problem and is trying to resolve it. They have suggested various ways to resolve the problem including instituting a "lottery" system where kids entering in kindergarten would be in a lottery to see who gets into the school. Those who don't get selected have to get bussed to another local elementary school. This is of course a huge issue because we know that most parents like us bought in this neighborhood specifically because there was a new neighborhood school our kids could go to.

Now let me say at this point we are not affected because our kids are already in and even if Nicolas wasn't in there would be priority for siblings.

One of the problems is that the original school boundaries have been expanded to include some higher density housing which is adding a lot of younger kids. The Rivermark neighborhood has become extremely organized around this issue creating new Rivermark only mailing lists, meeting regularly, attending school board meetings in mass. It has been pretty impressive really and Melissa and I have been observing the activity because any negative change could dramatically affect our housing prices. Other suggestions for soling the problem include rezoning (to remove some of the high density housing) and adding portable trailers to the field near the school (this was actually our preferred suggestion).

There have been some very strong reactions to some of the suggestions from the school board, particularly to the rezoning which would negatively affect some housing prices. There is even a website against it which someone created, check it out: http://nocallejonrezoning.org/

Well today is the actual registration day for new students and the short term solution was to have a line-up for registration on a first come first serve basis. What's remarkable is that the line for today's registration started at 2PM YESTERDAY and that people have been out there all night. Additionally there have been "support teams" going over to the people in line (the government should run as efficiently as these people!) bringing them tea, coffee, spare tents, chairs, relieving them in line so they could go to the bathroom! It's amazing!

Here are a couple of links showing the people in line last night and with the tents!

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=3799598&l=90cd47a605&id=730436630

http://www.facebook.com/photo.php?pid=3799573&l=b37226d6df&id=730436630

In one of these photos there is a school board member who stopped by to see the activity. This to me is all amazing to watch and Melissa and I are so glad that we are beyond these problems.