Category: Doug

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::: Sigh :::

[doug]Well, today was not a day without some importance. Our new realtor came by to look at the improvements on the house and give us a market estimate. The reality of moving left me a bit panicky for a while, and then rather sad. I’ve never done well with big changes, and this move will separate me from where I’ve lived most of my life.

Ultimately, I need to grasp firmly the idea that we are in God’s hands, that it is He who (unquestionably) provided the job in Chelmsford, and that my wife and children need me at home earlier and need me closer to home when I’m at the office.

Nashua provides a quick commute, a good church and school[s], and affordable living. In a day or so, I’ll get through this emotional transition, but it’s a pain, and there·s still a great deal to pray about.

Onward …

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Greetings from Mexico!

[doug]I’ve been much too busy to keep the BLOG (or even the Mexico site) updated while in Mexico, although there is dial-up access – other things seem much more important.

Of course, the hard part is being so far away from Nichelle, but I had been homesick for Mexico for a couple of months.

I will post details of our missions trip soon, but one funny thing that has happened is that two girls have started fighting over our son John [john inline], just from seeing his picture. ¡Valgame Dios!

For Nichelle: LYMZ, TDS.

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Tish Hinojosa

I’ll post more narrative later, but last weekend Nichelle and I went down to hear the hauntingly beautiful, often plaintive, voice of Tish Hinojosa (more on that later) at the New Bedford Summerfest 2003 folk festival.

Here are a few images (yes, KI, I finally bought my own digital camera):

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Future Tech: 20 Hot Technologies to Watch (from PC Magazine)

[doug]Technology enthusiasts (or probably anyone else) will be interested in reading this article from PC Magazine about technologies that will definitely have an impact on our lives in the next 2 to 25 years. There’s some amazing stuff: Everything from E-Bombs (think EMP*) to Wireless Mesh Networks to Quantum Cryptography.

*Electromagnetic pulse, for those of you who weren’t interested in the Cold War, or have never seen “Dark Angel.”

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Dungeon Seiges the Wilcox Family

After hearing Phil Luchon tell as about half a million times, “You have to buy Dungeon Seige,” I finally picked up a copy of this $30 gem. It’s a role-playing game with an emphasis on action done by Microsoft and Gas Powered Games. David and Isaac beg to play it every day (and lament the fact that, unless they supplement their computer time with educational activities, they only get an hour of game time per day). A few screen shots are below.


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Family News Update

Well, it’s about time I updated a few family items; Nichelle can add her 2¢ later.

  • Isaac’s last day of school (second grade) was yesterday. He cried because it was over. He does much better in elementary school than I did.
  • Work at Kronos has been great, and a wonderful opportunity to daily improve my Java skills. One colleague pointed out that our team seems to have “the right amount of fun.”
  • My father’s health has actually improved (this was not expected)! He was able to walk into and out of church a couple of weeks ago, and the congregation appauded when he came in. This is a big difference from how he was doing at Christmas.
  • Nichelle’s pregnancy is halfway through, and she finally has another ultrasound scheduled for June 16, which should be the gender-determining one. (If this child is a boy, I’ll post a link to the e-bay auction soon.) If it’s a girl, we still need to pick a middle name. I’ll probably create an online submission form for suggestions. (Kherna Yoyo continues to insist the middle name should be Kherna.)
  • We are still working on our move to Nashua. The cosmetics on our current house are nearly done. I have a minor plumbing problem to correct, but the greenboard for the new bathroom ceiling is up. Nichelle is (as usual) doing her masterful job of spackling, patching, and painting. We do not yet have a house picked out in Nashua or Hudson, but we find reasonable listings every day. We continue to pray for God’s guidance in this.
  • The Mexico missions trip is back on after a one-year absence. I am going alone (sniff), but am looking forward to continuing to help with the church and children’s home in Constitución, as well as reimmersing myself in the culture. (I will be keeping The Missions Trip Site updated starting in a week or two, and will be porting the BLOG software to it, so I can do live updates from the trip. I read an excellent biography on Benito Juarez, the orphan-who-became-president. His story rivals that of Lincoln in some ways. I’d like to re-read the book before we leave, and take some notes.
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The Top 10 Things I Hate About Star Trek

[doug]Okay, I’m really a fairly big Star Trek fan, despite being very disappointed by the latest film, but this list on the Happy Fun Pundit site is too delicious to pass up. Somewhere down the page you’ll find my own comments.

Here’s item one from the list, to give you a sample:

Noisy doors.

You can't walk three feet in a starship without some door whooshing or screeching at you. My office building has automatic sliding doors. They're dead silent. If those doors went “wheet!” every time a person walked through them, about once a month some guy in accounting would snap and go on a shooting rampage. Sorry Scotty, the IEEE has revoked your membership until you learn to master WD-40.

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Sailing to Byzantium

[book][doug]Kevin Miller loaned me a copy of Sailing To Byzantium (published by ibooks, a truly excellent collection of science fiction novellas by Robert Silverberg. I would highly recommend this book, even to those who are not diehard science fiction fans. I think the only Silverberg I own is Sunrise on Mercury, but reading Byzantium makes me want to go back and re-read it. (Sadly, its buried deep in our packed-for-the-move book boxes.)

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The Matrix Reloaded

[doug]Note: I have tried to keep this as spoiler-free as possible. In the first 15 minutes of the film, I wasn’t actually sure I was going to like it. Although the opening featured quite a good look at the long-mysterious city of Zion, it was mixed with a somewhat drawn-out combination of scenes of a mass dance ritual in the “Temple,” (a bit reminiscent of some parts of Kim Stanley Robinson’s Red/Green/Blue Mars trilogy) intermixed with an uncomfortably erotic scene with Neo and Trinity. After that, though, things really took off.

Reloaded is significantly more complex than The Matrix. Obviously, the war against The System is not over, the machines have improved themselves somewhat, and much is revealed about how various programs operate within the system, and about the world of the Matrix in general. We are also given a much better understanding of how Morpheus and his crew fit in (or fail to fit in) against the backdrop of Zion’s culture and its military and political leaders. The origins or reasons for existence of some key charactes and “programs” are explained, but without the horribly unfitting and disappointing treatment Lucas gave to the Force with his Midichlorian explanation in Star Wars Episode I: The Phantom Menace.

There were a few disappointments, but not many: One of my favorite characters is not there—although his absence is explained. The background music is not as fitting (or as good) in several places, and sound effects were not quite as good as before, although I have been spoiled by viewing The Matrix in Dolby 5.1 surround at home where every bullet shell casing hitting the ground can be heard, and my son John [john inline] complains that the bass rattles stuff off his desk upstairs. To a certain extent, mostly due to the film’s larger scope and greater number of both protagonists and antagonists, the film, at times, feels to have been run by a different director.

The combat scenes (and we’ve all been jaded by knock-offs in everything from Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon to Shrek) were astonishingly well done, intense, and wonderfully choreographed—truly beyond anything I’ve seen on film. It was not the “same old, same old.” The depth of plot and concept far exceed the first film, and overall it requires far more thought cycles to process. Ultimately, this is an amazing film.

Coming in November, The Matrix Revolutions (and if you are patient enough to sit through the credits and music that reminds me of Erci’s cube at MediVation, you’ll be treated to a preview of what is to come).