2010 Look back
2010 was a learning year for me. I learned things about myself I didn’t know and I got to experience some new things. Out of all the things I learned in ’10 These are the top 5 things I have taken away from last year.
1. Life is an adventure – Sometimes we end up taking a chance on a part of our life and it works out to be a wonderful surprise. Last year I took a chance to meet a wonderful woman. If I didn’t take that chance to meet her I wouldn’t have know how awesome she is.
2. Sometimes awesomeness is about being lucky – When I went to Boston last year I managed to take a really good picture on the sunset cruise around the harbor. I got really lucky. I was just messing around with the camera settings and I managed to get everything perfectly lined up. I am still need to the whole DSLR camera world, but I was lucky.
3. Everyone needs time for fun and games – For a while in the past several months of last year I was feeling a bit stressed between work and all my personal obligations. I wasn’t giving me enough time to just have some good fun and enjoy some me time. I found it is very good to schedule me time when I get stressed. For me reading and playing video games are some good relaxers.
4. Writing is hard – It’s not easy to sit down and create an article. I have a hard time bring what’s in my mind down into words on paper, or in this case the digital representation of words. It can be a tough time to struggle with my internal voice about what I should be writing about and what I am writing about.
5. Believing in my skills – This past fall I decided to tackle getting A+ Certified. I finally managed to achieve that goal at the end of October. Before this moment I was worried if I had enough skill to pass these exams. Not only did I pass them I score a 90 on both of them. I realized that I can do anything I put my mind to and not to be afraid if you are good enough. This was my biggest lesson I learned for 2010.
Like this:
Achievement Unlocked: Snowpocalypse 2011
View from my office
On Wednesday the Capital Region was hit with a snow storm. It started on Tuesday night around 10 PM and didn’t stop until after 6PM on Wednesday. In some spots there was a break for a couple of hours around 1 PM. Depending on where you were in Albany or the surrounding area you got around a foot of snow or more. All School districts were closed and the Meteorologists were saying if you don’t have to go anywhere stay home.
After looking at the projected weather maps I figured that I would only hit bad roads going into work since the weather was supposed to clear up by early afternoon. I packed up my Bag of Holding and headed into work. Surprisingly he roads weren’t that bad, I just had to take my time in a few areas but overall it was pretty decent. I was very surprised on how things were cleared up.
Kindle love
Image by jandrosantana
It has been over three months since I got my Kindle. I’ve read one book and plenty of samples on it. I love my Kindle. I take it with me everywhere I go and enjoy reading on it. After I got the Kindle I spent all of September reading “The Girl with the Dragon Tattoo” by Steig Larson in trade paperback. Reading a paper book after spending some time with the kindle is a whole different subject.
I can say that reading on a kindle is a different experience than reading a book. The ability to look up words or make highlights is a very nice feature to keep things going. Reading a book like “The Girl With The Dragon Tattoo” and being able to highlight and write notes can make the experience more enjoyable. Alas I did not read the book on my Kindle so I was not able to take advantage of those features.
I am currently reading “It’s Ok to Manage Your Boss” By Bruce Tulgan. In this book I’ve used highlighting and note taking to full advantage. After I started using the features I can see how much I can use them on a regular basis for a book like Dragon Tattoo.
I do love my Kindle and am very happy with my choice.
The Disappearing SMS Conundrum
I am a digital packrat, there is no way around it. I have saved every text message I sent and received since I got my new smartphone, The Droid Incredible, in May of this year. That is almost 6 months, for me that is well over several thousand text messages. I say this to set up how completely devastating it was to me yesterday. It was like any normal day at work and near the end of the day I was finishing some projects up and texting with a person about some things. When I got a response back from a message I went to check it out. I opened my messaging app and there was no messages at all, nothing was in there. I felt a great disturbance in the force. I started to panic a bit figuring that maybe it was the phone glitched on me.
I rebooted.
“It probably just needs a reboot as the OS needs to refresh itself to get the messages back” I said to myself.
I was trying to reassure the panicked part of me freaking out that I lost SOOOOO many text messages. I watched as the phone booted up, this had to be the longest boot up I had ever witnessed. When everything loaded I went to my messaging widget.
Nothing. I open it up, I see a blank screen. I go to the android app marketplace and downloaded handcent. No messages at all. Nothing, nada, empty. I am not sure why I feel sad, but I did. On my previous HTC phone I was flashing a new rom and wiping text message out, this time it felt different. I checked the Application info in the Settings menu. There is 820kb of data it is taking up. Do I delete the data and just toss the towel in or do I research this problem more.
I do some research and find this seems to be a problem in at least several cases. I think the data is still on the phone and I will look for was to access it, but for now I have lost a lot of text messages I wanted to keep and I blame HTC and Verizon for this.
To The Stars – Broken Dreams of NASA
I’ve been debating writing this post for well over a month, but I feel like I should. I’m not a scientist, I’m just a geek who has has romantic dreams about space and feels like the US is rudderless with space exploration. I was raised on a good diet of Sci-Fi shows, novels, and movies about space. I feel like the current administration hasn’t given us any defined goals, just no more moon missions and here is a bunch of extra money to do Low Earth Orbit things. NASA itself is conflicted on what to day. Ask a variety of scientist or people on what we should do in space and you’ll get as many answers as people you ask.
The current administration doesn’t feel like we should return to the moon. Why? If we plan to go to Mars at some point the Moon is a perfect training ground. It would allow us to try to set up a base and give us some prep on how a Mars mission may unfold. With the discovery of water on the Moon we can learn to harvest it in preparation for Mars. This would be invaluable knowledge that will serve a purpose. In addition the knowledge of how to build architecture on a foreign bodies surface with in three days range would be easier than one that is 6 months or more away.
I feel as though NASA’s goals are not clearly defined. It feels like no really knows what direction to send the space program in. President Obama has selected a flexable option for NASA which cancels the Constellation program. It looks like Congress is going to fight that cancelation only to look good for their home districts. Yes NASA does some amazing things and will continue to do amazing things with their budget, but I wonder what they could achieve if we set some vary daring goals for the agency. Going to asteroids and the like is all good, but that can be accomplished with missions to the Moon. If we can land on the Moon we can land on an asteroid.
My other issue with the lack of vision for NASA is it’s been over 30 years since we last touched down on the Moon. We have not had anything to excite the population. Someone needs to say NASA this is your next target whether it’s the Moon or Mars. Excite the population and we can do amazing things dare I say impossible things. I feel as though we are not doing enough to show the youth of today the wonders of exploration and science. Some days I could be day dreaming about when I will see a man on the Moon again. I know at the pace NASA is taking I will never live to see a man walk on Mars. That is something I hope will happen and I hope to be proven wrong about.
While doing some cleaning through some of my parents things I found two large format TIME Magazines about the moon landings. After thumbing threw them I knew that if that same excitement was around when I was younger I would have a very different career than I do now. Science can help fuel our imaginations about what’s next or about the amazing things we can accomplish if we work together.
I know that all the Science Fiction tv shows and novels are not the future. But it’s fun to imagine and wonder what if, right? They do serve a purpose, to make us wonder when we will break free of being happy with circling the this blue marble. Out there is space, a very interesting place that will show us things that we have yet to dream about. Who knows what we will encounter when we take the first major steps out of our cradle towards a larger destiny. I love science almost as much as I love technology, in fact without science technology wouldn’t exist.
Science is very important to us all, without it we would not have the everyday items in our lives. From the cell phones we use everyday to the microwave in our offices that heat our lunches to the computer you are reading this on it is all based on science. I can only imagine what we will create and what new items will be in everyday use in the future.
Sometimes I look up at the night sky and wonder what would it be like to actually see the Orion Nebula or the Pleiades Cluster from a spaceship. To go places where few have traveled and to encourage others to push forward into that frontier. I wonder how much more beautiful the Butterfly Nebula would look in person then through Hubble images. I then stretch my hand forward toward the skies and To The Stars . . . . . only for that to come crashing back down to Earth. Maybe, just maybe, someone will dream big again and let their imagination inspire us to achieve the impossible. If we don’t use our imagination that’s a shame. It’s what allows us to bring our dreams into reality.
Dr. Phil Plait also has an excellent write up about this very same lack of vision which you can check out here: 40 years later, failure is still no longer an option
I’ll leave you with one video that inspired a generation back in the 60’s to reach out for dreams of the impossible, maybe one day we will have a speech that will inspire us to do even greater things.
Last Blog before Boston
I will be heading out to PAX East today. By the time this goes up on my site I will already be traveling to Boston. I am bringing my digital camera and will be taking notes to write a follow up blog about this convention. It should be an interesting time. I would follow my updates on twitter, but I am unsure how much I will be using it this weekend.
I look forward to enjoying this weekend!
