Shredding cont'd

I continued to sort and shred today. I'm now going through old magazines and business papers which include computer graphics, object-oriented programming, and teaching C++/Java programming. I spent all day doing this and now have about 15 bags of chaff. I'm also preparing to sell some of my old magazines on eBay, but I have little hope that anyone would want them, nevertheless I can at least try.

Shredding

We've collected many papers over the years mostly for tax reasons - much of it receipts. So recently we've started to get rid of some of these especially ones that are older than 7 years (some were over 20 years old). Nevertheless today I shredded over 3 hours and got all of it done. We have a industrial strength shredder that has a massive cross cut unit above and bucket beneath. When done I had filled five white kitchen garbage bags full of chaff.It was kind of a nostalgia trip looking at some of the receipts before grinding them up. Such as a receipt from the hospital for "Baby Girl Watt" for the birth of Katie who will soon be turning 20. I think it's time to get rid of this stuff, but something in me says that I'm destroying part of my history.

Then there was two

The holiday season is winding down. Justin headed back to NC today. I'm sad.

Merry Christmas

Breakfast, stockings, presents, lunch, family phone calls, munchies, naps, DVD movies, TV movies, light dinner, chocolate souffle, nice comfortable day.

Hike

Justin, Matthew and I went to Creek Camp for a hike today while the women were at work.

Three outta three

Justin arrived yesterday afternoon. So the family is now complete. We chatted and joked around the dinner table while eating lasagna that I made in the afternoon and munched on Christmas cookies for dessert.

Goodbye jigsaw

When I was growing up I spent many hours down in my basement workshop making things. Among the tools my dad had was a drill press and a jigsaw. At some point when I was older and had my own home I transported the jigsaw to Poughkeepsie, New York. The drill press remained in my father's home in Orchard Park, NY. Then later I moved the jigsaw to Austin where it's been in the garage workshop. Since arriving it began to make strange grinding noises. So a few years back I took it apart and found that internally it was severely damaged. Since then it has sat apart and unused. A few weeks ago we were notified of a bulk garbage pickup starting this week. So today I moved the jigsaw and its wooden stand to the street. It makes me sad, because it was something that was my dad's, it had been a part of my life and I had spent many wonderful hours creating things with it. Goodbye old friend.

Two outta three

Matthew arrived home for the holidays. So we've got two out of three with us now. Although we're quiet people, it feels good to have both him and his sister at home. Very nice.

Vacation

Home on vacation and just bummin'

Almost vacation

Well tomorrow I was supposed to begin my vacation. I'd be on vacation until the end of the year, but I have a few things to do so I'm going in to work instead. This means that I'll take another day off at the end, that is, on January 4th. I'm even considering taking a half day on Thursday too, because I have an important conference call to do, and I'm releasing the very first version of some software then. That means I'll be back to work on the afternoon of Jan 5th. Even if I'm off I think I'll do some work at home.

Sidetracked

I've been doing some programming and I'm psych'ed. Today I really looked forward to going in and working on it. When I got there I started to add to it. Then after an hour at about 9:08 AM I happened to look at my daily calendar, and realized that I had an all day meeting to attend. Oh no! So I stopped my programming and I went to the meeting. Then on top of this meeting I had promised to have lunch at work with my daughter. Because this requires her to be signed in I had to get the paperwork done yesterday. I couldn't cancel it and anyways she's worth it. I left the meeting at 12:30 PM. In addition, she didn't have the car so I had to drive home and pick her up and drive back to work. This alone took about 20 minutes. Regardless we did have a nice lunch and it was nice to talk together. Then I drove her home and returned to work at 2:00 PM. In the meantime I missed a crucial demo and shortly the meeting ended at 3 PM. I returned to my office, talked to some of my co-workers, and soon it was time to go to running class at 4:30 PM. As a result, I barely did any programming today yet I was so psych'ed. Oh well there's always tomorrow. I'm really looking forward to it.

A nice day

I did my running this morning, and although my stomach was a bit upset afterwards, I felt really good doing it. Upon returning I had a nice hot shower, and lunch with Katie. Then I went out, rented a DVD for tonight, and bought fixins for Swiss Steak, a recipe handwritten by my Mother and handed down from my Paternal Grandmother. It requires me to beat round steak into submission and cook it with tomatoes, celery and spices. I can't wait to eat it over a bed of rice. I remember fondly when I was growing up. It cooks for hours to further tenderize it. While waiting, I'm sitting in a quiet house, covered by a blanket, reading a good book, smelling the food on the stove, and appreciating that it's been a nice day. Ahhhhh.

It's real quiet in the house

Kathy is away on her yearly trip to Williamsburg, Virginia with stitching friends, and Katie's at work. So the house is real quiet. Katie's job started yesterday, so today is her second day. Her shift is from 5:00 AM to 5:30 PM. She'll work each day until probably next Tuesday, and have it and Wednesday off. I think Monday is overtime, but I'm not sure of that. Then her week starts all over again. This is all to help bankroll her next two semesters at university. It's the same job as she had last summer, that is, it's at Dell as a temp employee breaking down computers. I think this means that her team unloads truck loads (yes, semi-trailer trucks) of previously manufactured new machines (never opened or used ones), takes them apart and puts the components and CDs back into the line to be re-manufactured. In any case the job start-up has been tough on her - the early starting hour and the long shift. I've tried to help her by making her lunch so it's ready when she comes home, and taking her out to dinner. I doubt I'll keep it up, but I just wanted to get her over the first few days, and in my own way I wanted to tell her that I'm proud and happy with how hard she's working. She's quite something.

Just a techie at heart

At work I've been doing some planning which I find boring, but it's got to be done. We're trying to estimate how much time it will take to do a programming job. It's based upon some existing programming so I've used that as a basis for comparison. Also I've used the time and size of the previous work. Given that I've calculated that it will take a number of person-years to accomplish. Now I've got to figure out how to make it take less resources.

In addition I've been doing some protyping to understand the work and to help me find a better way to accomplish the tasks. I much prefer doing this kind of work. I find it very creative. I think I've found a reasonable way to do one part of it too. Each day I've been changing and polishing this prototype as I learn more. I'm proud of it and want to make it the best it can be. Now I'm on to another piece of the system. So I'm just a techie at heart.