Ahoy, Me Hearties! It Be International Talk Like a Pirate Day

(David be most excited about this one.)

From “How to Be Speakin’ Pirate-Like” (You’ll want to view the full page at their site; it includes vocabulary):

Startin’ Rules:

  1. Double up on all your adjectives and you’ll be bountifully bombastic with your phrasing. Pirates never speak of “a big ship”, they call it a “great, grand ship!” They never say never, they say “No nay ne’er!”
  2. Drop all your “g”‘s when you speak and you’ll get words like “rowin'”, “sailin'” and “fightin'”. Dropping all of your “v”‘s will get you words like “ne’er”, “e’er” and “o’er”.
  3. Instead of saying “I am”, sailors say, “I be”. Instead of saying “You are”, sailors say, “You be”. Instead of saying, “They are”, sailors say, “They be”. Ne’er speak in anythin’ but the present tense!

The Wilcox Family’s New Look

Above (click to enlarge): The Wilcox Family has a new look.

  • Isaac is Hordhunter, a Night Elf druid. (He can polymorph into a bear at present.)
  • David is Stridar, a Dwarf paladin.
  • Nichelle plays sometimes. (She is actually afraid of becoming too addicted to the game.) She is Jassariss, a Night Elf warrior.
  • I chose to be a Gnome rogue, skilled at stealth and assassination (with trade specialties of mining and—of course—engineering. I can make bombs and dynamite now, and will progress to a host of interesting gadgets.)
  • Even Naomi has a character, Chritine, a Human rogue. (I’ll have to talk to her about that outfit, or buy her a nice dress the next time I’m in Stormwind or another big city.)

Our friend Phil Luchon convinced us to get a trial subscription to Blizzard’s World of WarCraft fantasy-based MMORPG (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Game). The kids had begged for months, having used his account to play when he visited and brought his computer, but it wasn’t until trying it for myself that I realized WoW (World of WarCraft) goes way beyond wandering the game world killing monsters. Approximately 7 million other subscribers (as of this September) worldwide seem to agree.

The game world itself is huge. There are two main continents at present, and an expansion is promised later this fall that I expect will make the game world even bigger, and introduce new races to play. There are eight races, each with six different class types, such as hunters, rogues, or priests. You can pick different occupational skills—I chose engineering (of course), and can now build things like dynamite and bombs. David in particular loves to design characters; I still have the first one I created, but will definitely add more later.

WoW has an excellent social aspect as well. Quite often I team up with my friend Phil, or other people who regularly game on the server I use at the time I use it, and go out adventuring. Besides teaming up for quests, there are ways to set up official guilds of similar-minded gamers within the game, including creating one’s own guild insignia.

I love exploring. The terrain is vast and wonderous, and varies as much as the terrain on Earth. There’s an underground tram that runs between two large cities, and you can rent a griffin to fly on to get between most other major locations. The game has e-mail, banking (including safety deposit boxes), an auction system much like eBay, and quite a bit of humor.

Last night I set up NaNi’s in-game button bar to include some of the commands we normally type, like “whistle,” “train,” “silly,” and “dance.” (“Silly” makes the avatar tell a joke. “Train” is one of our favorites, as it makes any of the characters pretend to be a locomotive, including appropriate gestures and whistles.) Anyway, when NaNi was away from the keyboard, David walked up and started clicking the icons I set up for NaNi. She noticed, and yelled, “Hey! That’s my character!”

I’d write more, but I’ve been itching to play, and the kids are finally in bed …

Update

After nearly a month playing World of WarCraft, our appearances have changed somewhat. On the left is Nichelle’s Night Elf character, with much improved clothing/armor, as she nears level 14. Nichelle is funny, she hates the idea of leaving Teldrassil, the island plateau on which the Night Elves live, because it’s so beautiful.

In the middle I’m wearing the goggles I made for my Gnome rogue character. (Engineering rules!) I have discovered that I really enjoy the real roll-playing aspect of the game, having been awed by a character named Sinisterlady’s excellent roll playing skills and imagination. My regret is that more players don’t stay in character or treat the game world as “real” and behave accordingly, even though the server we use is designated a roll-playing one. Our friend Phil Luchon and I often quest together, and we’re both developing consistent personalities for our characters. We do quite a bit of dialogue where we trade humorous insults—many involving size—back and forth, and that has been great fun.

On the right Naomi’s character is wearing a new dress that Nichelle purchased for her and mailed using WoW’s in-game e-mail system. I have sent her another one, but she has to get to level 13 before she can use it. The boys and I have helped level her character up to level 5, because NaNi loves to walk around the game world, and she kept getting killed nearly immediately once she stepped outside of her starting location.

Vacation’s Over: Back to School

:: sigh :: No more carefree days filled with playing Halo 2 for Dash …

Well, summer’s over, and we’re all back to school, except for Nichelle.

All?

That’s right.

While Isaac and David are in school, Nichelle is taking time each day to work on letter recognition, shapes, and other skills with NaNi.

And, I’ve enrolled in a graduate certificate program in Software Engineering, offered by Boston University’s Metropolitan College, which should keep me busy enough to stay out of trouble. I’ll be taking two courses simultaneously for the next 14 weeks: Software Engineering, and Object-Oriented Object-Oriented Analysis and Design. In the spring I’ll grab another two. Best of all, the classes are taught on-site at Kronos, and the whole program falls under Kronos’ tuition reimbursement program.

In Software Engineering, I’m working on our class project with three co-workers I’ve worked closely with before: Stephan Arsenault, RaviShekar Gopalan, and Doug “JavaDoug” Ross. We’ve decided to build an online shared calendar program, tailored to families, and we’re building it in Ruby on Rails, probably with a MySQL backend. (I should get a BLOG up this weekend to chronicle that effort.) It’s going to be fun!

So far, Isaac and David are doing great at Tabernacle Christian School. Isaac’s attitude toward school and homework is much improved, and David is as eager and happy to be in school as ever.

Moultonborough, 2006

What a blessing! At the end of July, we spent a week at the Varney/Tingley cabin in Moultonborough, New Hampshire. It was, quite possibly, our best-ever trip there.

We saw two different foxes, a huge heron, and a loon, all at or near the cabin. (My sister saw a bear last year, although we missed it, but we keep hoping and watching.)

(Above) This is the cabin we stay in. It’s not very large, but has running water (from the pond) and a bathroom with a shower and commode, which to me makes the difference between roughing it and really living. I used to vacation here when I was young, and loved it. (The same family still owns the property.) It brings back powerful memories of my childhood, especially time with my parents. So much of the property remains preserved just as I remember it, from the beautiful interior woodwork on the doors and door frames, to the electrical wiring my father did, right down to the way things smell.

When we got there this year, I noticed that the water pump was running nearly constantly. The pump draws water from the pond and pressurizes it in a small tank to provide running water for washing dishes, showers, etc. I checked it out, and you could hear the water rushing back down the pipe after the pump would reach proper pressure, and in a few seconds it would start up again. Thinking the check valve at the bottom of the water line was stuck open, I went out in the Berri Belle 2 (a rowboat), and followed the water line back into the pond, discovering that it had a 3- or 4-inch split in it, though which the water was pouring out. I tried to remove the split section that night, but couldn’t get the coupling apart. The next morning I got a new coupling at the local hardware store, and was able to cut out the damaged section and reattach everything—and I didn’t even need to re-prime the pump. Everything was working perfectly. I was so proud, and kept thinking of all the things my Dad used to fix. (He used to barter projects at the cabin for the price of renting it. In fact, he and my Mom installed the original water system many, many years ago.)

But, I should have kept Proverbs in mind. About 24 hours later, I checked the pump itself, and noticed it was dripping, something it definitely had not been doing the day before. I couldn’t find the source of the leak, so I kept it under observation. By that evening, the leak had become a small spray, and we called the Tingleys. We agreed I could try to patch it, but if it failed, we would have to use buckets for the water. I bought some epoxy-like substance that was used for waterproof applications, and was thrilled that the patch held. It dripped a bit, but that seemed acceptable. Unfortunately, the split in the pump casing was getting bigger, and my first patch blew off the next day. I patched it again, and we ran the pump only when we were actively using it, although I had to prime it several times. The second patch lasted until the day before we were going to leave, at which point I gave up and started carrying buckets. The cowling over the impeller had split at the point it was seamed in manufacture, and would have to be replaced. (I think due to the age of the pump, 25-35 years, they ended up replacing it.) After spending so much time listening for the pump’s operation, I kept “hearing” it running in my imagination for a week after we returned home!

(Above) This is the primary beaver dam that made Berry Pond. There are at least two beaver dams that created Berry Pond. When I explained to NaNi after one of our canoe trips that beavers made the pond, she replied, “Actually, God did.” Never argue theology with a 2-year-old.

One day we drove up to the Kangamangus (or Kancamagus—I’ve seen both spellings) Highway, which runs through the White Mountain National Forest, mostly parallel to the Swift River. To our delight and surprise, Eric and Kate Neville’s path happened to run across ours while we stopped to play in the river and have a picnic. Eric and I worked at MediVation over five years ago, and we’ve stayed in contact, but not seen each other since. What an amazing coincidence, especially considering how little time each of us spent in that particular location! Eric took this picture for us.

Nichelle did almost all the driving all week, including the trip there and back, even at night. She loves driving, and hadn’t been able to do it in a long time, so she was eager to see how much she could do. When I got home, it actually took me a while to get accustomed to driving my car again.

We love Clark’s Trading Post. (Above) Here Naomi and I attack Nichelle, who was standing on the side, from our bumper boat. Naomi hated having other people squirt her, although she very much enjoyed attacking them! Clark’s even has stand-alone motorized squirt guns set up along the sides of the bumper boat pool, so those not in the water can join in the fun.

I can’t quite believe Clark’s charges only $12 for admission. (Above) Isaac tried their climbing wall well over 15 times, something that most places would charge $5 a pop for. He didn’t make it to the top, but really loved it. I tried it too, but couldn’t steel myself to go any higher than Isaac. Next year …

Of course, one of the best things about the whole week was that Nichelle was feeling good for the first time since November, and was able to be active and participate in everything we did all week. What a thrill. It was not many weeks ago that Isaac broke down crying, when he realized (based on her condition for months) that Mom wouldn’t be able to do anything with us on our vacation. We praise God He has allowed Nichelle’s recent good health. It possible that the vitamin D deficiency causes her problems, but we won’t know until many months from now.

(Above) Clark’s has a costume photo studio, and Nichelle and NaNi love it. (The boys weren’t interested, as usual.) This was the first picture of Naomi that Nichelle picked out. Later on, she had me come back to the photo studio because she couldn’t decide if she should have gotten the more serious picture of Naomi. After some haggling, we bought that other one as well, and it has become our favorite.

The boys and NaNi love the paddleboat. (I thought it was great the years we used it as well.) We did almost flip it over once when David, Isaac, and I were all switching places and standing on the back.

(Above) This seaplane landed on the pond while we were there, which surprised me, because it was my understanding that the town prohibited that, which was why motorized craft aren’t allowed on the pond. It took off again as we were packing up to head back home.

We don’t watch television while we’re there, although I was tempted to turn on the TV and demonstrate to the kids what television in a mountainous area without cable is like. When we’re not outside, we read or play board games. Scrabble was very popular this year. Nichelle taught Isaac and David to play. One big difference, though, was that Nichelle, who normally destroys her opponents in Scrabble, lost five games in a row (four of them to me). After years of getting demolished by her, I finally seem to have “caught on” to the game, and was able to score some major victories by strategic word placement.

Inspired by the Seyranyan Family Circus, the kids did some acrobatics of their own in the days following our trip to Clark’s Trading Post. The Seyranyan family, from Moscow, is a must-see performance (they don’t perform on Fridays, so plan your trip accordingly). (Above) The kids invented this four-person pile-up one morning.

NaNi learned to row—sort of. I have a picture like this of me and my Dad, somewhere in a photo album my sister Joyce gave us.

We all spent a lot of time swimming, especially off of the raft that’s placed out in the deeper (about 12 feet) water. Naomi was no exception, swimming for hours at a time with her training ring, and occasionally using just a noodle (with very close supervision) or her lifejacket. She even jumped off the raft a few times.

(Above) David caught his first fish in three years. We discovered that live bait (worms) just can’t be beat for catching sunfish. (I don’t know much about fishing, and the kids have enjoyed learning as we go.) He caught this fish just after introducing himself to one of the families who lives on the pond. They were pulling fish out right and left, and invited him to have a try. I am always impressed with his social skills.

(Above) Naomi caught her first fish this year. She was absolutely thrilled. She caught 17 sunfish in about an hour and a half, all by herself. Isaac and I baited her hook and helped remove the fish. At one point, she turned to me and said, “I couldn’t have done this without you. Thank you, Daddy,” and gave me a big hug. She can be so sweet it melts my heart.

(Above) Isaac insisted this was a pike, but it appears to be a pickerel. (He’s not often wrong about biology or zooology—or in this case ichthyology.) It was Isaac’s big catch of the week. Right now it’s at home in our freezer, waiting for Nichelle to prepare it. We let the kids keep one fish each year to eat, although David’s sunfish were not eating-worthy, so he has accepted a single bite of Isaac’s fish when it is ready instead. I am also glad Nichelle is willing and able to gut, clean, and cook the fish, because I’m not sure I have the stomach for it. (If I ever travel in time, I will be sure to go forward, instead of into the past, because I have zero nontechnological skills.)

(Above) This part of the pond, opposite the beaver dam, we hadn’t explored before, although we’d been through many of the channels the beavers keep open to the east of there. The morning I found the dam I went out in the kayak, and got really close to the heron several times. (I wasn’t trying to bother him—he kept flying ahead of me and perching along the route I was taking. Sadly, I hadn’t brought my camera. Herons are huge, and surprisingly graceful in what appears to be a flight in slow-motion.

Berry Pond is absolutely lovely, especially on a clear day or at sunset. We also enjoy going out on the water at night, especially when the bats are out hunting. When it’s clear and one can normally see our own spiral arm of the “Milky Way.” (Personally, I think that’s a stupid name for our galaxy; if I ever travel to another galaxy, I’m going to tell them I’m from Andromeda.)

Several times a week NaNi announces, “I want to go back to the cabin!” as do Isaac and David. It’s a sentiment we all share.

When You Sing, I See Monsters

Here are a couple of recent anecdotes involving singing:

Naomi does seem to have a good ear for music. It may be a little too good. The other night I was tucking her into bed, after our quick bedtime prayer time together, and asked her if she wanted me to sing with her. She responded, “No, Daddy, when you sing, I see monsters.”

A week or so ago after church on the church playground, Naomi and Isaac were on the swings, Isaac on one set and Naomi on another. They were both singing a beautiful praise song, and my heart was full of joy. Then, after a few minutes, Naomi decided she wanted to sing all by herself: “Isaac!” she screamed, “Let me sing by myself!” It wasn’t quite as praiseworthy.

John Is Leaving

John turned 18 last Thursday. He celebrated this by launching a covert attempt to move out of the house. (Why it was covert is beyond me. He has every legal right to live where he wants; whether he was ready to do so, or whether this was in his best interests, is an entirely different question.) We did allow him to stay with his sister in Brockton for the past week, partly because we believed a break would do us all good.

Yesterday we phoned John at his sister’s house. We’ve talked to Felicia a number of times this week, but this is the first time we called to speak to John. We wanted to find out what sort of John would be returning today. We were hoping to see reflection and perhaps even repentance. Instead John told us he would be returning today to get the rest of his things. (This was one of the possibilities we were prepared for.)

When we asked where he was going, he wouldn’t tell us. He said he’d tell us eventually.

We told the kids. David cried for a long time. He is so loyal and so loving.

From last fall to late winter, John was all that we’d hoped he would become. His grades were quite good; he was clearly working hard in school, and had a part-time job in an accounting office. His attitude was excellent. He was helpful at home, and even managed to get along well with Isaac and David. For the first time in years, he behaved like one of the family, and it really felt that he was finally “home.” It was absolutely wonderful! I was so proud of him, and relished being able to brag about his achievements. We don’t know what precipitated the change, but all that disappeared, to our sorrow, by the early spring. Of late, especially the past few weeks, he has intentionally (as he admitted to our assistant pastor) been attempting to foment strife at home in the hope he could use that as an excuse to leave, not generating the level of discord he sought, but making life less-than-pleasant for all of us.

It appears John plans to live in Brockton, paying some rent, with someone he knows; perhaps a [biological] family member. He said “might have a job,” and that he intends to attend a vocational school in the fall.

I truly hope he succeeds.

Mind-Body Connection: Rheumatologist at Brigham …

Or, how much pain can you work through on a daily basis?

How much would your body allow you to do with pain on the scale that’s typically 7 to 10? I’m frustrated, because I’d prefer to be active, being able to minister and do for my family like I once did…. and no one seems to “get” that.

—Nichelle

Yesterday we pulled off the usual logistics nightmare that involved a trip into Boston. Trish Dunn took the kids, except for John, who after a very disheartening and inexplicable episode, is spending a week in Brockton with his biological sister and her husband.

Dr. Anderson, a highly-recommended rheumatologist based at Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston (where Isaac was born), seemed to be highly skilled, and asked excellent interview questions. He is, unless we’ve missed some, the tenth doctor Nichelle has seen in the past two years.

Primarily, we forcused on the constant, very severe pain she is experiencing. He was able to rule out bone disease, tumors, diseases involving musculare weakness, nervous system disorders, and joint diseases such as osteoarthritis and synovitis. This left him with our old enemy diagnosis: Fibromyalgia. He explained that Nichelle had already tried most of the medications (and all of the types of medications) that normally help alleviate Fibromyalgia symptoms.

He suggested and later reiterated that he believed exercise would provide the most benefit. We twice explained very clearly that the recurrence of the debilitating symptoms occurred during a period of consistent and signficant daily exercise, and that the inability to do things like walk more than a few steps without intense pain makes exercise very difficult. He spoke of the “mind-body connection,” and how things like Yoga (although he does not “believe” in it per se) or meditation and other things that have to do with the mind-body connection can, in conjunction with exercise, be of benefit, indicating that one can change “how your body talks to you.”

He asked if she’d tried any of the various restrictive or eliminating diets, but we don’t know if he was thinking about the consideration of food allergies or sensitivities, or just throwing out possibilities. We discussed other alternative therapies: chiropracty (provided only very temporary relief), therapeutic massage (provided only very temporary relief), and accupuncture, which we are willing to try (there’s an opiate receptor model for how accupuncture actually works, which may make it ideal for treating pain), but we haven’t been able to find a practitioner covered by our insurance.

One of the more interesting things he asked Nichelle was, “If you were on the Western frontier 150 or more years ago, how would you handle this?” Later I thought of a really good answer: “She’d become a judge, and hang a whole lot of doctors.”

Overall, it was a long, discouraging day, especially due to the added concern about John.

This morning Nichelle seemed determined to fight through and determine just how much she could accomplish before completely succumbing to the pain. She even drove herself to the lab (5 minutes away) to get the latest bit of blood work done.

Nichelle made appointments today with the Pain Management Clinic at Southern New Hampshire Medical Center, and with who we hope will be a good primary care physician. Both are not until the end of July or first week of August.

Dr. Hall (who ties with Dr. Rescigno for “Best Doctors We’ve Ever Had”) called back with her latest test results: Nichelle’s vitamin D level was good, and her PTH (parathyroid hormone) level was good, which means that the hyperparathyroidism was indeed caused by the vitamin D deficiency. The importance of vitamin D was largely overlooked until fairly recently, we learned from Dr. Hall, and vitamin D deficiency has turned out to be very common, especially in the Northeast.

We’ll have some other test results, such as for hemoglobin disorders and blood cortisol levels, next week.

Later today Nichelle goes in to Mass. General for two bone density tests. The illustrious Debi Costine is providing transportation (we’re bribing her with Middle Eastern food), and Cindy Lavoix and company are coming over to our house to watch the kids (or play with our game systems; I’m not sure which), which means I get to go to work.

Dr. Hall / MGH Visit 2

We had an excellent visit with the thorough Dr. Hall, although we are all still getting used to each others’ humor. To order the blood tests, Dr. Hall needed a diagnosis code, and was wondering what to put, so I suggested Munchausen.

Dr. Hall doesn’t believe Nichelle’s problems are primarily endocrinological, although there are endocrine issues, such as the previously diagnosed vitamin D deficiency and [probably] secondary hyperparathyroidism that she will continue to investigate. All of the thyroid tests came back fine. The adrenyls were good, and to our surprise, the various blood cell counts appeared to be normal as well.

She is going to do more hemoglobin-related tests, to look into various possible hemoglobin abnormalities that haven’t been tested yet. A blood-cortisol level test is also being done, apparently primarily because of Nichelle’s hair loss, although cortisol will affect edema as well. Last on the list of things to be tested now is bone density, both from the spine and hip. That will happen on Tuesday.

Another unlikely but possible problem is called cyclic edema. It’s difficult to treat, and it’s too early to diagnose, but it’s at least a consideration.

The next step is rheumatology. Dr. Hall referred Nichelle to a a senior endocrinologist, whom she described as “terriffic” and “very helpful,” at Brigham and Women’s. In an unexpected blessing, we got an appointment for Monday afternoon.

Running Multiple Versions of Firefox Simultaneously

(Based on information from this entry at the Dojo Foundation BLOG. This information is for Windows machines, specifically for concurrently running Firefox 1.0.7 and 1.5.0.x, but the same information applies to other versions of Ff as well. David Schontzler’s aforementioned post covers ‘Nix machines.)

As a Web developer on some fairly complex projects, it’s important to be able to run the current Firefox browser, as well as the previous release.

These instructions are based on having first installed Firefox 1.0.7.

Locate your current Firefox profile. Normally it will be in a folder under your Application Data folder, typically such as the following:

C:Documents and Settings{user_id}Application DataMozillaFirefox

Copy the entire Firefox directory someplace convenient, so you have a backup, for when you miss a step and something goes horribly wrong. (I know—this would never happen to me, either, but I was grateful I had a backup the two times I munged this setup and had to fix my initial Ff 1.0.7 installation.) You want to be able to fix your Firefox extensions in the event your running of Firefox 1.5 tries to upgrade them, which is a one-way process.

Then download and install Firefox 1.5.0.x, to a location other than the default location. (I recommend using a directory named C:Program FilesMozilla Firefox 1.5, as C:Program FilesMozilla Firefox is the default.) Do not launch Firefox 1.5 yet. (Be sure not to tell the install wizard to launch Firefox at the end.) If you do, you’ll need to quit the browser, and replace the now-upgraded profile folder with the one you backed up.

To allow you to clearly identify separate processes in the Task Manager process list, and to avoid accidentally running the Firefox 1.5 installation without the batch file that will preserve the Firefox 1.0.7 profile information, I recommend renaming the C:Program FilesMozilla Firefox 1.5firefox.exe to firefox15.exe. However, if you choose to perform this step, you’ll need to rename firefox.exe to firefox15.exe each time you perform an upgrade (such as from 1.5.0.3 to 1.5.0.4) of Firefox 1.5. (See “Future Upgrades,” below.)

Next, you’ll need to create a batch file to launch Firefox 1.5 and load a Firefox 1.5-specific profile:

set MOZ_NO_REMOTE=1

start "Firefox" "C:Program FilesMozilla Firefox
1.5firefox15.exe" -P "Firefox 1.5"

set MOZ_NO_REMOTE=0

The above batch file presumes that Firefox 1.5 is installed in the directory specified, that the executable is named firefox15.exe, and that a user profile named Firefox 1.5 will normally be used. If you’ve used values for any of these items that are different than the recommendations above, alter the portions marked in red accordingly.

The first time you launch Firefox 1.5, the Profile Manager will appear. Create a profile that matches the name used in your batch file.

If you want to change the icon shown (on the taskbar and the Firefox title bar), create a new icon and place it in C:Program FilesMozilla Firefox 1.5chromeiconsdefault with the name main-window.ico. You can find one that has a “1.5” overlaid atop the regular Firefox icon here. You can also find utilities to change the text in the title bar itself, such as the Titlebar Tweaks Firefox extension—which, ironically, has not yet been officially updated for Ff 1.5.0.x (as of June 7, 2006). You can install an updated, but unofficial, version from here.

I have also found that using significantly different themes (skins) for my different Firefox versions helps keep them straight at a glance.

And, of course, if you prefer to make Firefox 1.5 your default Ff version, do so, and modify the batch file to point to 1.0.7 instead.

Future Upgrades

The best thing to do when one is about to upgrade Firefox 1.5.x, is rename the firefox15.exe back to firefox.exe, run the ugprade, and then rename it back. If you don’t, you’ll find that your firefox15.exe is still around, but that the upgrader has added its own firefox.exe, requiring a delete-and-rename, as well as producing some interesting quirks, like Firefox not realizing it’s been upgraded because the .exe you’re running is the old one, while everything else is new.