Tralfaz

Author: geoffand

  • Getting Spoilt – MacBook Air edition

    In July, I splurged and bought a Mac Book Air. My MacBook pro was a little aged, and I wanted to go for a smaller, lighter laptop, yet I didn’t want to go too small. Plus I am a Mac person.

    I have been using it pretty heavily, and it has been super solid. It has enough storage, it is fast enough, and while I would like the retina display, I am really grooving on the 12+ hours of battery life I am getting on it.

    My macbook pro is semi-permanently attached to a sweet 24″ monitor, and my Drobo for backups, and the Mac Book Air is my walking around computer.

    This last weekend, I was moving websites to my new hosting account (see ‘A Bad Day – Webhosting“) , so I unplugged the MBP and relocated to the couch. Oh. My. God. That thing is friggin HUGE compared to the Air. Yes, it is a 15″, and it is from the generation before the Retina display, but compared to the Air, it is heavy, huge, and cumbersome (it also has a quadcore processor, 16G ram, and a terabyte of disc).

    It honestly felt how I thought a 17” laptop felt. Too big.

    Nope, I don’t think I will be going back to that monstrosity. It will remain my stationary system until it dies, then I will probably replace it with a Mini.

  • Memories of my Mother – Malt-o-meal

    One of the memories I have of growing up was eating Malt-o-meal. For those who are unaware, it is a hot farina of wheat cereal. We didn’t eat it often, but what I “liked” about it was the lumps. They were like finding nuggets of chewy goodness in every bowl.

    Malt-o-mealEvery time my mother made malt-o-meal, it had lumps. Sometimes they were small, sometimes they were large, but they were always present. I just assumed that malt-o-meal had lumps in it.

    Then I moved out, and years later started making it myself. Surprise, there weren’t any lumps. No matter how I made it, as long as I followed the directions, I had creamy, smooth hot cereal. No lumps.

    I began experimenting with it, and it turns out that while stirring is important, the secret to lump free malt-o-meal is to slowly add it to the boiling water, while stirring the water. You pretty much have to just dump it all in at once to get lump formation.

    What a strange memory of my Mother, lumpy Malt-o-meal.

  • A good ride

    I haven’t been able to ride for a few weeks. My left foot was strangely painful, and the cycling shoes made it far worse.

    Today I sucked it up suited up, and headed out into the chilly (50F) morning. I put on an easy 21 miles. Didn’t set any speed records, and I didn’t want to push it too hard.

    The result is good. No pain in the foot, and my hand was OK too (it is a mazing what 800 mg of ibuprofen can do…)

    I may head out again tomorrow.

    My shoes are going to be replaced though. They are 12 years old, and are thoroughly shagged. The problem is I have wide feet. 11.5 EEE to be precise, so I had to order up a pair of cycling shoes. I am sure that they will improve the situation as well.

    Looking forward to heading out tomorrow. Good to be back in the saddle.

  • Finally a Friday

    I don’t usually celebrate the coming of a Friday like many people do, but it has been an outrageously busy week, so I am thankful that it is a Friday.

    I have wrangled with powerpoint, struggled to do deep competitive analysis, and put together training material next week. Couple that with a heavy load of meetings (strange, as I have been good at staying away from meaningless meetings) and I am fatigued.

    Add to that learning that my left thumb has severe osteoarthritis, and it has been a bummer of a week.

    Oh, and today is day 7 without coffee or caffeinated beverages.

    Not sure how I am going to recharge this weekend. I will try to see if I can cycle tomorrow (my left foot has been painful), and I will do some more website migration (still trying to empty out my MediaTemple account). But I need to NOT check email this weekend. So I will leave my laptop at home, me thinks.

    TGIF indeed.

  • The best time of the year: Adopt a Physicist!

    Twice a year, the SPS (society of physics students, a branch of the American Physics Society) hosts a forum which matches physicists (like me) with high school classes with students studying physics. They ask questions and we respond.

    I have done this regularly since 2009, and it is the highlight of my year. Each physicist who volunteers gets “adopted” by three high school classes, and then the discussion begins.

    There are some predictable questions, like “How was it studying in college?” “What was your favorite subject” and a lot of questions about being a product manager, working in industry, and how physics helps me there.

    But the real fun is the tangents that the discussions go down. In one of my classes, one of the students is planning on studying cognitive language recognition, one is planning on studying physics in a foreign country (can’t help you there), and it turns out that one of them plays guitar, so we have talked about music as well as physics.

    I am glad to participate, and I hope that the students get what they expected out of it. But, guilty admission, it is a LOT of fun.

  • Caffeine watch

    Day 5 and I am hitting a major wall in the afternoon. I need self control to not go grab a coffee. And I have meetings until 6:30 PM tonight. Groan.

    Wish me luck

  • When being a nice guy backfires: Traffic edition

    I have an easy commute. A hair over 7.5 miles straight up a surface street, never too bad traffic. I am never in a hurry (well, very rarely), so I am often willing to let someone in who is leaving a driveway.

    But today I goofed. I waved some lady who was trying to get out of a gas station. I figured she wanted to just merge into traffic. BZZT

    She took my opening, then proceeded in slowly obstructing ALL traffic to get to the left turn lane. Sigh.

    So I, and several other (justifiably pissed off) people missed the green light while this tool stopped traffic to get to the left turn lane.

    When I am in a similar situation, I :

    • Take a deep breath. Really, it isn’t the end of the world.
    • Merge into traffic, but look for the next convenient (and safe) place to make a U turn.
    • And get to where I want to go a minute or two later.

    What I don’t do is obstruct 3 lanes of traffic, hanging in limbo, just to “make” that next left turn. Sheesh.

  • Punishment – Going caffeine free

    Every couple of years I give up the evil bean. I usually get to a point where my tolerance is huge, and I find my self caffeinating throughout the day. Then my sleeping get disrupted, and I get cranky and irritable (ok, crankier and more irritable than usual).

    Then I go off caffeine for a few months, and all is better. But the transition is hell. Headaches, missing the taste of coffee (my preferred dosing mechanism), and sleeping more than usual. Some people think I am crazy for knocking it out, but it really does help, even if it is for a limited time (I think the longest I lasted before was 9 months.)

    Today is day 4, and the worst of the withdrawal symptoms are abating. Headaches are almost gone. The desire to rush out to the coffee maker is much lower. I am already sleeping better (or perhaps that is just my wishful thinking).

    One thing is for certain, the blood pressure medication I take has greatly reduced the headaches. They were/are much less severe than in the past. One thing to be thankful for.

    I know that it is just a matter of time. Perhaps I will have a 6:00AM flight, or need a lift before a customer presentation. I will be back on the bean, but for now, I will learn to live without it.

    (* Of course I will not go completely caffeine free. That would mean giving up chocolate. Not gonna do that man.)

  • A bad day – Health edition

    Well, I have been struggling with my hand for a while. I thought I had jammed my thumb,and it wasn’t healing properly. After 6 weeks or so, I realized that it wasn’t getting better.

    About a month ago I finally went to my GP and after some X-Rays it looked like it wasn’t a damaged tendon, or “jam”. The X-Ray showed some bone spurs and what looked like it might be the start of arthritis. Gulp.

    Today I met with a specialist. It is far worse than I originally thought. I have no cartilage left in my left thumb, there is severe arthritis, several bone spurs, and it is pretty much as good as it will ever be.

    Next week I will get a special splint to hold it motionless at night. 6 weeks of that to see if the pain is reduced. If not, then we move on to cortisone shots.

    At this point there is no cure. I am considered too young for surgery (don’t ask, it is a bad option), and eventually it will all wear in and hurt less.

    One thing is for certain, today was not a good day. I can’t deny that I am getting old. Sigh.

  • Bad dog owners

    Owning a dog comes with certain responsibilities. Most people have a good grasp of these responsibilities. Keeping them licensed (if required), getting their rabies vaccination, keeping them healthy, feed them quality food, the usual items.

    Not here fidoBut increasingly I see lots of evidence of bad dog owners. I talk about dog feces left in the landscaping of the neighborhood. There are laws, there are signs posting that it is both illegal and a health hazard to not clean up after your dogs.

    But still, every time I am out with my dogs, I see lots of evidence of bad dog owners. Piles everywhere. There are definitely some places where people repeatedly let their dog do their business (as there are literally dozens of identically sized piles).

    The frustrating thing is that our neighborhood has plenty of stations that dispense baggies, and have receptacles for the bagged waste, and they are emptied regularly by the landscaping maintenance gnomes. Still people feel no shame in letting their pooches poop wherever they happen to be.

    And walking the neighborhood, I see lots of people who have let their dogs deposit their waste in people’s yards. It is bad enough that they don’t feel compelled to pick it up int he common area landscaping, but for f*cks sake, don’t just leave it when your best friend bends a biscuit on someones yard. Do they not get upset when they see dog waste in their yard?

    Sheesh.