In my previous post, The Elusive Balance, I had mentioned that my goal was to enter twenty-three CDs into the Media_Title table. I am happy to report that this goal was reached, and the rack they were destined to fill is now completely occupied. After doing the updates to this table, however, I discovered some flaws in my "main" media table, which has caused me to reconsider the design of my database.
I wish I could remember where I had read this, but someone once wrote that the best way to start a database is to design it with pencil and paper. Although I've always agreed in principle that this was a great idea, in all of the databases which I've designed, I've rarely heeded this sage advice. This is partly because planning things often results in frustration and headaches for me, but also partly because I can "see" with my mind's eye what the database will look like and what it will do prior to a single keystroke being executed (note to the faint of heart and the true database newbs: semi-professional DBA on a closed course. Do not attempt at home or work. Especially at work).
One other caveat is necessary when discussing database design: don't be too afraid of change.
When the idea of Forty-Two first came into my mind is hard to say- it predates this blog by a few years at the very least. The concept was fairly modest, at first, and didn't even actually have music or media as its primary focus. It was actually my Lego collection. This was another project that grew by fits, false starts, and occasional bursts of inspiration and diligence. And it was done entirely in Excel. Over time, though, I saw the possibility of building something more powerful (and consequently more useful) in Access.
The earliest Access versions- starting in Access 2003, then moving to 2007 and finally 2010- were not grand by any stretch of the imagination, and were at first only intended to catalog music CDs. Eventually, movies seemed to be a natural addition and were incorporated, followed by books, software, console games and finally books in the latest iteration. And all of it goes back to Lego.
One of the problems I have with Lego elements is that although I do not have a large collection by many AFOL (Adult Fan of Lego) collectors' standards, I have enough to necessitate them being stored in different containers and in different locations in our home. As I was working in Excel, I found that I didn't have a really good way of taking this into account. When I realized that Access could handle this particular problem, another thought occurred to me: I could do this with media as well, and eventually incorporate things that were totally unrelated, and this could be useful in insurance planning.
That's the short version of the history of Forty-Two. The immediate future, as alluded to in the first paragraph, will see the end of what I often refer to as the "primary" table. It will be replaced by several (relatively) smaller tables, each being tasked with holding a specific type of media: music, videos, books, etc. Other tables will host data on Legos and electronics, for starters. And lastly there will be the helper table which exist primarily to normalize the database.
Whew! A whole blog post devoted to data and nothing but data. At this point some may be wondering what is up with the chairs in the title? Well, "Tables" alone sounded boring; "chairs" is pretty much an attempt at a hook to draw a potential reader in.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Saturday, October 25, 2014
Wednesday, October 22, 2014
The elusive balance
This is a little bit off of the beaten path for me, but something brought it to the fore last week. I was playing an online game when I got into a bit of a "contest" with a rival player. The rival wrote a very eloquently virulent multi-post letter about how evil my actions were and consequently this player needed to resort to extreme actions in the game. Neither of us was entirely right in our in-game stances and actions, and I did bristle on the first reading. After rereading it, though, I became convinced of something much more important than in-game behavior, and that is that I was spending too much time with this game. Make no mistake- this game is right up my e-alley and is well-designed. The problem is that it is a 24/7 RTS (real time strategy game), and therein lies the rub- it CAN be a major time suck. And I do have an offline life.
So, I made an announcement in-game that I had languishing projects, and have drastically cut back my involvement. I don't know how much time I've reclaimed, but I do know I've resumed work on my database.
The thing I find interesting about balance is that while it is ultimately a positive in one's life creating and maintaining it is certainly work- and not the fun sort of work. I'm certain most everyone experiences some sort of work which they really enjoy... for me, that might be blogging or photography. For Jennifer, it's creating delicious meals in the kitchen. For Mr. T., it's digital modelling... I could go on, but you could probably give an example or two from your own life.
Balance, I think, requires planning, steadfastness and a certain dash of practicality. As I was wrapping up my last job of the day, I had a few options for what to do when I got home. I don't usually go right to bed, but wind down a bit on a PC. I thought about a bit of weight training, which I desperately need to get back in to, but our training area outside of the Secret Underground Lair (SUL) is still not ready for prime time. So, Plan B was implemented: catch up on the aforementioned game, and get a blog entry at least started. I'm also trying to do a bit every day with my database in the SUL- this had been a goal when I first started working on it, but as many things go... well, the plan sounded good on paper!
Today, though, I have a very concrete data entry goal: enter or update twenty-three records in the Media_Title table. Twenty-three? Yes- it's a strange number, but it's the number of slots I have open in a small CD rack, so that is my goal for the day. They are stacked up behind me on a folding table, gently whispering just below the whizzing of three computer fans, calling out with their data entry siren song....
Right. Data entry was, is, and will always be... WORK!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
So, I made an announcement in-game that I had languishing projects, and have drastically cut back my involvement. I don't know how much time I've reclaimed, but I do know I've resumed work on my database.
The thing I find interesting about balance is that while it is ultimately a positive in one's life creating and maintaining it is certainly work- and not the fun sort of work. I'm certain most everyone experiences some sort of work which they really enjoy... for me, that might be blogging or photography. For Jennifer, it's creating delicious meals in the kitchen. For Mr. T., it's digital modelling... I could go on, but you could probably give an example or two from your own life.
Balance, I think, requires planning, steadfastness and a certain dash of practicality. As I was wrapping up my last job of the day, I had a few options for what to do when I got home. I don't usually go right to bed, but wind down a bit on a PC. I thought about a bit of weight training, which I desperately need to get back in to, but our training area outside of the Secret Underground Lair (SUL) is still not ready for prime time. So, Plan B was implemented: catch up on the aforementioned game, and get a blog entry at least started. I'm also trying to do a bit every day with my database in the SUL- this had been a goal when I first started working on it, but as many things go... well, the plan sounded good on paper!
Today, though, I have a very concrete data entry goal: enter or update twenty-three records in the Media_Title table. Twenty-three? Yes- it's a strange number, but it's the number of slots I have open in a small CD rack, so that is my goal for the day. They are stacked up behind me on a folding table, gently whispering just below the whizzing of three computer fans, calling out with their data entry siren song....
Right. Data entry was, is, and will always be... WORK!
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Sunday, October 19, 2014
Saturday Night Blogging- or, This Blog Won't Write Itself
I've got Saturday night off, which is a nice thing. Saturdays tend to be a bit odd for me, at least in comparison with most other folks I know. For starters, as I work nights, I spend most of my Saturday in bed. When I don't work on Saturday, Jennifer, Mr. T and I attend church at The Bridge, where we are members.
I was particularly excited about this evening's service, as Karl Clauson was scheduled to be speaking. Karl is a fascinating man and a wonderful speaker who never disappoints. As we approached the entrance, we saw a few folks wearing neon green Celebrate Recovery tee shirts.
Something was up.
Something indeed- CR was celebrating five years at The Bridge. The service started early, with lots more neon green tee shirts all around. And music. As AC/DC so eloquently phrased it, "the music was good and the music was loud". After the music, Heather spoke. I'm not going to spoil the surprise or muddy what she had to say by trying to summarize- I think her presentation will be available on The Bridge's website in a few days.
In the wonderful world of data, this past week has seen progress with both of the databases that I own. I had the opportunity to spend some time on Saturday morning with my work database- this will be a truly cool and useful tool once it is up and running. I did a few updates to a few tables, and solved a somewhat simple naming convention problem. All of our jobs are known by a numeral, but because some jobs have multiple versions (but are essentially the same job), I decided to add the alphanumeric designator which is normally associated with the job right after the job number for these jobs, thereby keeping each job number unique (sotto voce aside:yes, I am aware that I used "job" seven times in one sentence- eight if you count this one!). There are a few other types of jobs which further complicate things, in that they are under one job number but are really different jobs; for these, I've added a "Version" column to the table. So far- with just a little over a month's worth of data, the system is working.
Back in the Secret Underground Lair, data is also happening- and so is a new energy conservation initiative. Because of September's power outages- and in an attempt to conserve a bit of electricity- we've purchased a number of battery-powered motion sensing lights. In the short time we've had them, we've used them as emergency flashlights and area lighting in lieu of electrical lights. I've also taken to turning off a surge protector, which has a few "vampire" devices attached to it. I can't report with any certainty that we've lowered our electricity usage' but we do have fewer lights on.
My "big" database is coming along quite nicely. In spite of not being a huge data entry person, I had a surge of "git'r done" this past week and managed to update well over 200 entries this past week, mainly in the "Media_Title" table but also in the "Names" table.
That's all for now- I vacuumed and need to "freshen up" a bit before dinner.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
I was particularly excited about this evening's service, as Karl Clauson was scheduled to be speaking. Karl is a fascinating man and a wonderful speaker who never disappoints. As we approached the entrance, we saw a few folks wearing neon green Celebrate Recovery tee shirts.
Something was up.
Something indeed- CR was celebrating five years at The Bridge. The service started early, with lots more neon green tee shirts all around. And music. As AC/DC so eloquently phrased it, "the music was good and the music was loud". After the music, Heather spoke. I'm not going to spoil the surprise or muddy what she had to say by trying to summarize- I think her presentation will be available on The Bridge's website in a few days.
In the wonderful world of data, this past week has seen progress with both of the databases that I own. I had the opportunity to spend some time on Saturday morning with my work database- this will be a truly cool and useful tool once it is up and running. I did a few updates to a few tables, and solved a somewhat simple naming convention problem. All of our jobs are known by a numeral, but because some jobs have multiple versions (but are essentially the same job), I decided to add the alphanumeric designator which is normally associated with the job right after the job number for these jobs, thereby keeping each job number unique (sotto voce aside:yes, I am aware that I used "job" seven times in one sentence- eight if you count this one!). There are a few other types of jobs which further complicate things, in that they are under one job number but are really different jobs; for these, I've added a "Version" column to the table. So far- with just a little over a month's worth of data, the system is working.
Back in the Secret Underground Lair, data is also happening- and so is a new energy conservation initiative. Because of September's power outages- and in an attempt to conserve a bit of electricity- we've purchased a number of battery-powered motion sensing lights. In the short time we've had them, we've used them as emergency flashlights and area lighting in lieu of electrical lights. I've also taken to turning off a surge protector, which has a few "vampire" devices attached to it. I can't report with any certainty that we've lowered our electricity usage' but we do have fewer lights on.
My "big" database is coming along quite nicely. In spite of not being a huge data entry person, I had a surge of "git'r done" this past week and managed to update well over 200 entries this past week, mainly in the "Media_Title" table but also in the "Names" table.
That's all for now- I vacuumed and need to "freshen up" a bit before dinner.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Sunday, October 12, 2014
Autumn, Mr. T and WTF?
It's my thinking that new blogs are often gestated in the final closing thoughts of a blog that is on the cusp of publication. Such is the case with this post.
I got off work fairly late this past Saturday morning, which was fine as we had a scheduled appointment with our HVAC guy to have our furnace checked out. As I pulled into our driveway, I decided that autumn had officially arrived, as there was a light coating of frost on the grass which was still in shadow. Once our furnace was given a clean bill of health, I finished editing my previous post, published it and went to bed.
The previous evening, Mr. T did something he had not done in some time- he got up on his soapbox and donned his virtual "little professor" white lab coat (I've been doing some cinema/television references of late- the "white lab coat" is an homage to The Angry Beavers "Stinky Toe" episode in which Norb acquires the dreaded "stinky toe", and Daggett vows to find a cure; Dagett finds and dons a white lab coat, and one of the scientists observes that Daggett MUST be a scientist because he's wearing a white lab coat). I was pinned to my chair in the Secret Underground Lair for fifteen minutes while Mr. T waxed eloquently about video games and video game characters, specifically comparing and contrasting Deadpool and Duke Nukem. To be honest, I have scant familiarity with either, but Deadpool has been in the news of late, as there is a Deadpool movie coming out sometime next year. This is particularly interesting to me, as actor Ryan Reynolds will play the Deadpool character, and my good IRL buddy comedian Ryan D. Reynolds is a huge Deadpool fan.
In actuality, Deadpool has been a fairly hot topic for over a week. When Ryan's not doing stand-up comedy, he supports himself by being a custodian. As his job is not particularly fast-paced, we sometimes have time to discuss things like Deadpool. Ryan's been on a quest to lose weight, and to date has dropped a significant number of pounds- I don't have exact numbers handy, but I believe he's dropped ~10% of his mass YTD (and he's NOT a small fellow). In any event, the casual reader is by now thinking, "WTF does this have to do with Deadpool?"
For starters, I love the concept of "the aside", even though I don't always return to the topic at hand. As Ryan has lost weight, his clothes have started fitting differently. He's been cinching up his belt so much that his beloved Punisher buckle broke and so he was forced to purchase a new buckle... you guessed it: Deadpool.
He and I had been discussing all of this when the topic of the Deadpool movie came up. Now, frequent readers of this blog have probably grown to be accustomed to my writing style and the fact that I keep it pretty clean. I've addressed this at least once before- its not because I'm a prude, but because I want as many folks of all ages and backgrounds to be entertained and informed by my blog. However, "WTF" came up in the discussion Ryan and I were having about Deadpool, so it is worth at least a quick recap here....
Here's the rub: the proposed rating for the upcoming Deadpool movie in the United States is PG-13. As I've said, I know little about Deadpool, but apparently he's quite the snarky, womanizing, violent one-liner wielding human weapon of mass destruction, and many an interwebz commentator has been so dumbstruck at the PG-13 rating as to respond in the only way possible: WTF?
I, however, do my best to keep my online persona pretty clean. Even though I might be thinking "WTF?", I generally make every attempt to be polite. In light of the fact that there are so many three-latter organizations out in the world- many of which few have heard of- I came up with my own: the World Trade Federation. Ryan said he would use Whisky-Tango-Foxtrot to get around the autosensors, but when he heard my solution, he had to laugh and said it was brilliant.
That's it for today. No data to report; I did spend some quality time in our IRL archives and culled out quite a bit of old billing statements, so I give myself a pass.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
I got off work fairly late this past Saturday morning, which was fine as we had a scheduled appointment with our HVAC guy to have our furnace checked out. As I pulled into our driveway, I decided that autumn had officially arrived, as there was a light coating of frost on the grass which was still in shadow. Once our furnace was given a clean bill of health, I finished editing my previous post, published it and went to bed.
The previous evening, Mr. T did something he had not done in some time- he got up on his soapbox and donned his virtual "little professor" white lab coat (I've been doing some cinema/television references of late- the "white lab coat" is an homage to The Angry Beavers "Stinky Toe" episode in which Norb acquires the dreaded "stinky toe", and Daggett vows to find a cure; Dagett finds and dons a white lab coat, and one of the scientists observes that Daggett MUST be a scientist because he's wearing a white lab coat). I was pinned to my chair in the Secret Underground Lair for fifteen minutes while Mr. T waxed eloquently about video games and video game characters, specifically comparing and contrasting Deadpool and Duke Nukem. To be honest, I have scant familiarity with either, but Deadpool has been in the news of late, as there is a Deadpool movie coming out sometime next year. This is particularly interesting to me, as actor Ryan Reynolds will play the Deadpool character, and my good IRL buddy comedian Ryan D. Reynolds is a huge Deadpool fan.
In actuality, Deadpool has been a fairly hot topic for over a week. When Ryan's not doing stand-up comedy, he supports himself by being a custodian. As his job is not particularly fast-paced, we sometimes have time to discuss things like Deadpool. Ryan's been on a quest to lose weight, and to date has dropped a significant number of pounds- I don't have exact numbers handy, but I believe he's dropped ~10% of his mass YTD (and he's NOT a small fellow). In any event, the casual reader is by now thinking, "WTF does this have to do with Deadpool?"
For starters, I love the concept of "the aside", even though I don't always return to the topic at hand. As Ryan has lost weight, his clothes have started fitting differently. He's been cinching up his belt so much that his beloved Punisher buckle broke and so he was forced to purchase a new buckle... you guessed it: Deadpool.
He and I had been discussing all of this when the topic of the Deadpool movie came up. Now, frequent readers of this blog have probably grown to be accustomed to my writing style and the fact that I keep it pretty clean. I've addressed this at least once before- its not because I'm a prude, but because I want as many folks of all ages and backgrounds to be entertained and informed by my blog. However, "WTF" came up in the discussion Ryan and I were having about Deadpool, so it is worth at least a quick recap here....
Here's the rub: the proposed rating for the upcoming Deadpool movie in the United States is PG-13. As I've said, I know little about Deadpool, but apparently he's quite the snarky, womanizing, violent one-liner wielding human weapon of mass destruction, and many an interwebz commentator has been so dumbstruck at the PG-13 rating as to respond in the only way possible: WTF?
I, however, do my best to keep my online persona pretty clean. Even though I might be thinking "WTF?", I generally make every attempt to be polite. In light of the fact that there are so many three-latter organizations out in the world- many of which few have heard of- I came up with my own: the World Trade Federation. Ryan said he would use Whisky-Tango-Foxtrot to get around the autosensors, but when he heard my solution, he had to laugh and said it was brilliant.
That's it for today. No data to report; I did spend some quality time in our IRL archives and culled out quite a bit of old billing statements, so I give myself a pass.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Saturday, October 11, 2014
The October Sexperiment and Blogger's Rules, Part Deux
I should warn you- it's been my experience that sequels are generally not as good as the originals. I share a home with at least 3.0 videots... um, the math and logic get really fuzzy here, as I am video-challenged in comparison to the others in our home. Our oldest son is truly "the little professor" when it comes to all things video; his areas of expertise include anime, action films and the weapons in these movies, as well as soundtracks and is an almost on a par with The Oracle of Bacon when it comes to connecting actors, actresses, producers and directors. Jennifer's film knowledge is more mainstream, and includes a lot of small-screen (television) knowledge as well. Mr.T reserves his Sunday nights for video entertainment. In selecting his video entertainment, he will consider suggestions from his interwebz posse as well as the three of us. He has one overriding rule: if it's a series- movie or television- he will not watch it out of order.
Me? I want to enjoy a movie- I like explosions, gunplay and special effects, as well as clever dialogue. I love parodies, and every time I say "Part Deux", its my homage to Hot Shots! Part Deux, which was probably the finest sequel ever produced. Period. Hot Shots! was an excellent example of a parody, but somehow Part Deux eclipsed it. In the realm of movies that had only one sequel (that is, not being a trilogy or a "franchise"), Part Deux stands head and tail feathers above the rest (*movie reference). Of movies which were trilogies, Part Deux blows away The Empire Strikes Back, steals the thunder from Back to the Future Pt 2, and ... The Two Towers? Really! I'm a Tolkien fan, and while the movie is beautifully done, it is STILL a second. Our daughter was reading the trilogy, and I asked her what book she was reading. "The Two Towers," she innocently replied. Nonchalantly, I swooped in for the kill and asked, "Are you at the part where they're walking through forest*?" "YES!," she replied, "how'd you know?"
(*For those who have never read it, it seems that approximately 50% of this book is spent walking through the forest).
So here I sit, writing a Part Deux to a blog.
The original blog did quite well, but it strangely enough was actually a commentary on an earlier blog. I just took a look at the numbers, and the last two blogs are getting slightly better numbers than previous blogs, and I've received a relatively disproportionate number of hits from China and France, but to be painfully honest, I've never written a blog before about implied sexual escapades, and I'm not sure I could even do a reasonably entertaining sex blog. The only stab in the dark I can make about the increased views from China and France is that sex sells bigger there, Or not... after all, this IS the interwebz,
It's a good thing for me that this blog's unifying theme is data.
On the blog side of data, I just wanted to reiterate that sex does seem to work. In all honesty, I did enjoy the wordplay, but I don't see myself writing another piece like that anytime soon.
Getting back to data, it's autumn here in North America, and Jennifer and I separately came to the conclusion that some cleaning and organization were long overdue. A couple weeks ago, I moved some file cabinets from the basement to a more strategic location, and yesterday we discussed updating our filing in earnest. We picked up some additional supplies at Sam's, and are now officially loaded for (filing) bear.
In the database part of data,I just finished updating the Media_Title table with a couple shelves' worth of data, bring the Media_Title count to nearly 1K. That's not hugely impressive by most standards, but I'm pleased for a couple of reasons. First, I'm getting back to putting time into the care and feeding of the database, and second- the database is helping me to better organize the physical media that I'm cataloging. I've cataloged approximately 40% of our known digital video titles; once these are done, I'll tackle the VHS, and then its time for music, and then Daniel's anime.
And then games. Ugh. To paraphrase Kurtz' most excellent soliloquy in Apocalypse Now, "I've played games, games that you've played. But you kave no right to call me a gamer."
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Me? I want to enjoy a movie- I like explosions, gunplay and special effects, as well as clever dialogue. I love parodies, and every time I say "Part Deux", its my homage to Hot Shots! Part Deux, which was probably the finest sequel ever produced. Period. Hot Shots! was an excellent example of a parody, but somehow Part Deux eclipsed it. In the realm of movies that had only one sequel (that is, not being a trilogy or a "franchise"), Part Deux stands head and tail feathers above the rest (*movie reference). Of movies which were trilogies, Part Deux blows away The Empire Strikes Back, steals the thunder from Back to the Future Pt 2, and ... The Two Towers? Really! I'm a Tolkien fan, and while the movie is beautifully done, it is STILL a second. Our daughter was reading the trilogy, and I asked her what book she was reading. "The Two Towers," she innocently replied. Nonchalantly, I swooped in for the kill and asked, "Are you at the part where they're walking through forest*?" "YES!," she replied, "how'd you know?"
(*For those who have never read it, it seems that approximately 50% of this book is spent walking through the forest).
So here I sit, writing a Part Deux to a blog.
The original blog did quite well, but it strangely enough was actually a commentary on an earlier blog. I just took a look at the numbers, and the last two blogs are getting slightly better numbers than previous blogs, and I've received a relatively disproportionate number of hits from China and France, but to be painfully honest, I've never written a blog before about implied sexual escapades, and I'm not sure I could even do a reasonably entertaining sex blog. The only stab in the dark I can make about the increased views from China and France is that sex sells bigger there, Or not... after all, this IS the interwebz,
It's a good thing for me that this blog's unifying theme is data.
On the blog side of data, I just wanted to reiterate that sex does seem to work. In all honesty, I did enjoy the wordplay, but I don't see myself writing another piece like that anytime soon.
Getting back to data, it's autumn here in North America, and Jennifer and I separately came to the conclusion that some cleaning and organization were long overdue. A couple weeks ago, I moved some file cabinets from the basement to a more strategic location, and yesterday we discussed updating our filing in earnest. We picked up some additional supplies at Sam's, and are now officially loaded for (filing) bear.
In the database part of data,I just finished updating the Media_Title table with a couple shelves' worth of data, bring the Media_Title count to nearly 1K. That's not hugely impressive by most standards, but I'm pleased for a couple of reasons. First, I'm getting back to putting time into the care and feeding of the database, and second- the database is helping me to better organize the physical media that I'm cataloging. I've cataloged approximately 40% of our known digital video titles; once these are done, I'll tackle the VHS, and then its time for music, and then Daniel's anime.
And then games. Ugh. To paraphrase Kurtz' most excellent soliloquy in Apocalypse Now, "I've played games, games that you've played. But you kave no right to call me a gamer."
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Sunday, October 5, 2014
The October Sexperiment and Blogger's Rules
It's high time I coined a word, and "sexperiment" seemed like a good one... except it turns out I didn't coin it. There's a book that was written a few years ago by Ed and Lisa Young with "Sexperiment" being the main word in the title. I've obviously not read the book, so I am not equipped to comment on it. My sexperiment is my previous blog, "My Night In a Cage with a Hot Woman", in which I sought to see if a suggestive title and a bit of teasing, along with accompanying keywords, would boost readership by a significant amount. As of right now- a little more than a day after publishing it, the answer is a guarded "maybe".
The numbers have not been huge, but there's been a bit more geographic diversity than I've seen of late- France, Poland, Canada and a country in Africa (the country in Africa has experienced some unrest over the past few years, so I won't be giving it a shout out). Before I forget Jennifer corrected me on a particular datum from that post- our anniversary is in a few days, not a few weeks. It's not that I don't know the date; I'm not the stereotypical husband when it come to that, at least. Then again, in the U.S. date convention, October 10, 1987, is rendered 10/9/87, so there is absolutely NO reason for me to forget it. Of course 10/9/14 falls on a Thursday this year (it was a Friday when were wed), so chances are good we won't be doing anything special on our "special" date, as Thursday night is our busiest night of the week, and I work nights, so we'll try to do something special on Saturday or, more likely Sunday.
I should also mention a couple of rules I try to follow in blogging. I try to avoid writing anything that may be morally questionable. This is generally not difficult to do, as I generally filter my writing and have no natural inclination to expound on salacious themes. Whenever I write on a topic that causes the hair on my neck to rise, I ask Jennifer to proof it before publishing. I'm certainly not a prude, but I write under the understanding that- I.R.S. assertions about emails aside- nearly everything that happens on the interwebz is stored somewhere. And I do not want my writing to come back and bite me. I also do not want to embarrass her. I'm also fairly certain that I've never used anyone's name without their permission. Jennifer, Anna and Ryan, for example, have all given me verbal permission to use their names. And apart from Ryan, I never use last names. Ryan D. Reynolds is a special case- he's an aspiring comedian, so this is publicity for him. Mr. T is also an exception of sorts: he's our youngest son. When he was first mentioned in a blog, he was under eighteen (the age of majority in the U.S., a.k.a. "adulthood"), so I felt a certain amount of anonymity was required. He is now eighteen, but his persona of "Mr. T" has been established in this blog, so he remains to be known as Mr. T.
I've also always had a very compact, terse writing style, so I try to keep my blogs relatively short and readable, although as I look at this particular blog, there are atypically large chunks of words. My writing style has pushed me to the brink in the past.
I've never been a model student, but have always had an interest in history. In high school, even though I was in the top third of my class, I had to beg, plead and petition to get into the senior Advanced Placement European History class (and for the record, I also applied for the A.P. English class, but my high school cancelled the class because they had decided that the incoming seniors' writing skills were deficient). Near the end of the school year, I took the AP History test, and decided to take the English test- even though I had absolutely no idea of what to expect. The AP classes not only taught the subject, but prepared the students for the test. At the time, the tests were graded on a scale of one through five, with a three generally guaranteeing college credit. I scored a four on the history test. On the other hand, I "only" scored a two on the English test. I should mention that I got this score with zero prep or mentoring, and I was the ONLY senior in a class of approximately 330 that even took the test.
Flash forward to freshman year of college. My then-girlfriend Dolores (sorry, Dolores, I couldn't find you on Facebook) and I were sitting in the Student Government office one day, and she casually asked if I had a term paper that was due soon. I looked at my planner- she was correct.
I had a paper due the next day.
The thing that I often forget to mention in this story (which has been told a number of times) is that the instructor was quite the feminist, so much so that she was know to grade males harsher than females, The college had been, until quite recently, an all-women's institution.
When the assignment was first given, I immediately had an idea for the topic. Each member of the class was to pick a Renaissance leader and show or prove how they fit the criteria as defined in class. The problem was this: the leader I had picked was Napoleon Buonaparte (as I write this, I have a red squiggly line under the word Buonaparte; however, this is not a misspelling- when he first joined the French army he was a Corsican and only in his mid-twenties changed his name to the more French-sounding Bonaparte). Discounting the popular feeling that he was not particularly "enlightened" and that he came to power at the dawn of Romanticism I felt I could successfully argue my case.
I had my work cut out for me. And the paper was due tomorrow.
Now, in my defense, when the paper was first announced, I hauled myself over to Rebecca Crown Library, and as was (and still is) my standard practice for doing research, I pillaged the shelves for anything related to the subject. Because of my daily ritual of visiting The Sutlers' Wagon, I had a good background in the Napoleonic period. However, because of my as yet undiagnosed ADHD, those books ended up sitting in a rather tall stack in the Student Government office. What happened next was the stuff of which legends and epic songs would be written.
As this was in the days of prehistory (that is, before computers), my paper needed to be typed out. I had an outline in my mind, and wrote as I found information to support my ideas. When I finished a page of handwriting on a looseleaf page, Dolores would type it. We labored for several hours, and in the end I had eight and a half pages of double-spaced text- Sister Kaye Ashe's minimum was ten pages.
To summarize: I wrote a paper the day before it was due, a page and a half short of the minimum, well outside the specified period, and handed in a rough draft which was submitted to an instructor who was known to be a rough grader.
The paper got an "A". Like I said, I'm a terse writer.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
The numbers have not been huge, but there's been a bit more geographic diversity than I've seen of late- France, Poland, Canada and a country in Africa (the country in Africa has experienced some unrest over the past few years, so I won't be giving it a shout out). Before I forget Jennifer corrected me on a particular datum from that post- our anniversary is in a few days, not a few weeks. It's not that I don't know the date; I'm not the stereotypical husband when it come to that, at least. Then again, in the U.S. date convention, October 10, 1987, is rendered 10/9/87, so there is absolutely NO reason for me to forget it. Of course 10/9/14 falls on a Thursday this year (it was a Friday when were wed), so chances are good we won't be doing anything special on our "special" date, as Thursday night is our busiest night of the week, and I work nights, so we'll try to do something special on Saturday or, more likely Sunday.
I should also mention a couple of rules I try to follow in blogging. I try to avoid writing anything that may be morally questionable. This is generally not difficult to do, as I generally filter my writing and have no natural inclination to expound on salacious themes. Whenever I write on a topic that causes the hair on my neck to rise, I ask Jennifer to proof it before publishing. I'm certainly not a prude, but I write under the understanding that- I.R.S. assertions about emails aside- nearly everything that happens on the interwebz is stored somewhere. And I do not want my writing to come back and bite me. I also do not want to embarrass her. I'm also fairly certain that I've never used anyone's name without their permission. Jennifer, Anna and Ryan, for example, have all given me verbal permission to use their names. And apart from Ryan, I never use last names. Ryan D. Reynolds is a special case- he's an aspiring comedian, so this is publicity for him. Mr. T is also an exception of sorts: he's our youngest son. When he was first mentioned in a blog, he was under eighteen (the age of majority in the U.S., a.k.a. "adulthood"), so I felt a certain amount of anonymity was required. He is now eighteen, but his persona of "Mr. T" has been established in this blog, so he remains to be known as Mr. T.
I've also always had a very compact, terse writing style, so I try to keep my blogs relatively short and readable, although as I look at this particular blog, there are atypically large chunks of words. My writing style has pushed me to the brink in the past.
I've never been a model student, but have always had an interest in history. In high school, even though I was in the top third of my class, I had to beg, plead and petition to get into the senior Advanced Placement European History class (and for the record, I also applied for the A.P. English class, but my high school cancelled the class because they had decided that the incoming seniors' writing skills were deficient). Near the end of the school year, I took the AP History test, and decided to take the English test- even though I had absolutely no idea of what to expect. The AP classes not only taught the subject, but prepared the students for the test. At the time, the tests were graded on a scale of one through five, with a three generally guaranteeing college credit. I scored a four on the history test. On the other hand, I "only" scored a two on the English test. I should mention that I got this score with zero prep or mentoring, and I was the ONLY senior in a class of approximately 330 that even took the test.
Flash forward to freshman year of college. My then-girlfriend Dolores (sorry, Dolores, I couldn't find you on Facebook) and I were sitting in the Student Government office one day, and she casually asked if I had a term paper that was due soon. I looked at my planner- she was correct.
I had a paper due the next day.
The thing that I often forget to mention in this story (which has been told a number of times) is that the instructor was quite the feminist, so much so that she was know to grade males harsher than females, The college had been, until quite recently, an all-women's institution.
When the assignment was first given, I immediately had an idea for the topic. Each member of the class was to pick a Renaissance leader and show or prove how they fit the criteria as defined in class. The problem was this: the leader I had picked was Napoleon Buonaparte (as I write this, I have a red squiggly line under the word Buonaparte; however, this is not a misspelling- when he first joined the French army he was a Corsican and only in his mid-twenties changed his name to the more French-sounding Bonaparte). Discounting the popular feeling that he was not particularly "enlightened" and that he came to power at the dawn of Romanticism I felt I could successfully argue my case.
I had my work cut out for me. And the paper was due tomorrow.
Now, in my defense, when the paper was first announced, I hauled myself over to Rebecca Crown Library, and as was (and still is) my standard practice for doing research, I pillaged the shelves for anything related to the subject. Because of my daily ritual of visiting The Sutlers' Wagon, I had a good background in the Napoleonic period. However, because of my as yet undiagnosed ADHD, those books ended up sitting in a rather tall stack in the Student Government office. What happened next was the stuff of which legends and epic songs would be written.
As this was in the days of prehistory (that is, before computers), my paper needed to be typed out. I had an outline in my mind, and wrote as I found information to support my ideas. When I finished a page of handwriting on a looseleaf page, Dolores would type it. We labored for several hours, and in the end I had eight and a half pages of double-spaced text- Sister Kaye Ashe's minimum was ten pages.
To summarize: I wrote a paper the day before it was due, a page and a half short of the minimum, well outside the specified period, and handed in a rough draft which was submitted to an instructor who was known to be a rough grader.
The paper got an "A". Like I said, I'm a terse writer.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
Friday, October 3, 2014
My night in a cage with a hot woman
My life is pretty conventional- boring by some standards, I suppose. In a few weeks, Jennifer and I will celebrate our twenty-seventh wedding anniversary (yay, us!). Well, all things considered, maybe we're not conventional in that sense. Conventional more in the manner of Bilbo Baggins: no drama, no adventures. We mean what we say and we say what we mean.
This past Wednesday night was different, though- at least for me.
I work nights, of course. I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before, but the "double-wide in the sky" is a secured office. Our entire facility is secured, of course, requiring credentials just to enter the building, but because of the nature of the work and the data that is handled in my department, there is additional security. I naturally can't go into the specifics, but only a small percentage of employees in the plant can simply walk in.
Chloe (not her real name, but in certain circles it might be thought of as exotic and sexy) came up to the office Wednesday night and knocked on the door. As she is well-known in the plant, she was admitted.
I should also mention that our plant is quite noisy, and I have a rather large fan on my desk because the HVAC in our office is challenged, to be polite. I was engaged in a project, and between the noise of the factory and my fan, I didn't hear the short conversation that took place between Chloe and Hagar (also not a real name- he asked to remain anonymous!), even though his desk is barely 15' (~5M) away from mine. Out of the corner of my left eye I thought I saw something apprehensive in his face, and then he gestured toward me. She seemed to sashay over from Hagar's desk to mine. She was casual but comfortable in her walk. The clap of her dust spotted, stained, steel-toed black boots seemed to accent her faded, form-fitting blue jeans and ink-stained t-shirt. I looked up, and she explained what she needed in her been-around-the-world alto voice. I looked up at Hagar, and he gave me that all-knowing "a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do" look. I said to her, "Sure."
I pushed my work aside, and we went off to the cage. This was the first time in my life that I'd ever been alone with someone of the opposite sex in any cage, and this one was watched 24/7 by cameras. In the harsh fluorescent lighting, I could see the glitter of the gold pixie dust on her face mixed with sweat which accented her plaintive eyes. When we arrived, she showed me her problem: her box. I hoped no one was watching (remember, there are cameras everywhere). I grabbed the box, and gently blew on it. Some- okay, a lot of dust came off, but the LED on the front panel continued to flash yellow. Paraphrasing the spokesperson from a popular Dell commercial from several years back, I said, "Dude! You got a Dell!" Even though her problem was not fixed, she laughed at this.
I'm not an A+ technician... in the real world where I work, HR doesn't even know what to do with me and my coworkers, so I like to think of myself as semi-I.T. On a good day I'm not too bad at problem-solving, so I thought this through: if I had a PC with a flashing yellow light under the power button that wouldn't boot- what would I do? The best answer that came to mind was this: untangle the spaghetti mess in the back of the PC: USB, power, Ethernet, and monitor cables all snaking around each other like in an Indiana Jones movie.
However, in the real world of home and church, I do provide technical support, so I did what anyone would have done: I got rid of the spaghetti mess. I unplugged EVERYTHING from the back of the PC, and then, after untangling the cable mess under the table, I blew on the all of the I/O ports and reinserted each cable.
I was not surprised when the PC booted normally.
She thanked me, and I returned to Data Services and my waiting project.
It is said that "sex sells". Well, to be perfectly honest, I don't really know how to write about sex- this little true story was my first foray into "off-color" writing- I hope a few laughs came out of it.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
This past Wednesday night was different, though- at least for me.
I work nights, of course. I'm not sure if I've mentioned this before, but the "double-wide in the sky" is a secured office. Our entire facility is secured, of course, requiring credentials just to enter the building, but because of the nature of the work and the data that is handled in my department, there is additional security. I naturally can't go into the specifics, but only a small percentage of employees in the plant can simply walk in.
Chloe (not her real name, but in certain circles it might be thought of as exotic and sexy) came up to the office Wednesday night and knocked on the door. As she is well-known in the plant, she was admitted.
I should also mention that our plant is quite noisy, and I have a rather large fan on my desk because the HVAC in our office is challenged, to be polite. I was engaged in a project, and between the noise of the factory and my fan, I didn't hear the short conversation that took place between Chloe and Hagar (also not a real name- he asked to remain anonymous!), even though his desk is barely 15' (~5M) away from mine. Out of the corner of my left eye I thought I saw something apprehensive in his face, and then he gestured toward me. She seemed to sashay over from Hagar's desk to mine. She was casual but comfortable in her walk. The clap of her dust spotted, stained, steel-toed black boots seemed to accent her faded, form-fitting blue jeans and ink-stained t-shirt. I looked up, and she explained what she needed in her been-around-the-world alto voice. I looked up at Hagar, and he gave me that all-knowing "a man's gotta do what a man's gotta do" look. I said to her, "Sure."
I pushed my work aside, and we went off to the cage. This was the first time in my life that I'd ever been alone with someone of the opposite sex in any cage, and this one was watched 24/7 by cameras. In the harsh fluorescent lighting, I could see the glitter of the gold pixie dust on her face mixed with sweat which accented her plaintive eyes. When we arrived, she showed me her problem: her box. I hoped no one was watching (remember, there are cameras everywhere). I grabbed the box, and gently blew on it. Some- okay, a lot of dust came off, but the LED on the front panel continued to flash yellow. Paraphrasing the spokesperson from a popular Dell commercial from several years back, I said, "Dude! You got a Dell!" Even though her problem was not fixed, she laughed at this.
I'm not an A+ technician... in the real world where I work, HR doesn't even know what to do with me and my coworkers, so I like to think of myself as semi-I.T. On a good day I'm not too bad at problem-solving, so I thought this through: if I had a PC with a flashing yellow light under the power button that wouldn't boot- what would I do? The best answer that came to mind was this: untangle the spaghetti mess in the back of the PC: USB, power, Ethernet, and monitor cables all snaking around each other like in an Indiana Jones movie.
However, in the real world of home and church, I do provide technical support, so I did what anyone would have done: I got rid of the spaghetti mess. I unplugged EVERYTHING from the back of the PC, and then, after untangling the cable mess under the table, I blew on the all of the I/O ports and reinserted each cable.
I was not surprised when the PC booted normally.
She thanked me, and I returned to Data Services and my waiting project.
It is said that "sex sells". Well, to be perfectly honest, I don't really know how to write about sex- this little true story was my first foray into "off-color" writing- I hope a few laughs came out of it.
As always, I am hochspeyer, blogging data analysis and management so you don't have to.
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