ben.parmeter

Uncle Rick threw down the gauntlet during our yearly Parmeter Thanksgiving get-together, deep in the forested hills of Oregon. A challenge to post something (even if it is only a weak one liner) to their respective blogs. Well, here you go. It’s not much, but it will do. Now Uncle Rick, let’s see if you can match your challenge as well.

Continuing with the monthly video theme, I managed to spend some time this weekend working on the video for June.  In this video, you’ll see a family camping trip to Grover Hot Springs (mainly the nearby falls), painting a clay pot in the backyard, the zoo and one quick photo of Claire and Suzy at a friends wedding.  A fairly short one this time, but action packed.

Again, if you’re interested in the technical side of things, I decided to give Kdenlive a spin this time, creating the entire clip with that software.  It is yet another outstanding video editor that has come to Linux recently – and I am thoroughly impressed with its capabilities.  It’s definitely got more of a learning curve than OpenShot, but it’s still reasonably intuitive.  I found that it is better at handling Pan & Zoom type effects (Ken Burns style) than OpenShot, with a much smoother result.  However, tiling photos and video is still something that I’ve found difficult to do – and has resulted in several crashes.  I eventually gave up on that effort.  The title generator is not as snazzy as OpenShot either.  But it seems to be snappier, and renders on the fly better than OpenShot.  I’m really torn between the two and may ping pong between them until I can decide which I like best.

July is going to be a much bigger video.  Until next time…

My gallery has laid fallow for much too long.  So I decided to do a little spring update by infusing it with some brand new photos of some of the things we’ve been doing in April.  Granted, most of these pictures are of Claire, but I think you’ll agree, she’s great material for photos.  I picked a few photos that I liked the best, so they may seem a bit random.  Head on over to the gallery or check them out below.

This post will officially break my 8 month long dry spell for posting to this blog.  I should complain about how I’ve been too busy to write, or spending more time with the new kiddo to get online, and all of those other excuses.  But alas, they will all fall flat in cyberspace.  I need to make time to write here on this page or my mind will wither and my creativity with it.   I know I’ve said it before but I really want to start writing more regularly again.  It’s cathartic, healing and introspective.  All things that I think would be good for my soul.

Alright, that’s all you get for today.  Back to work.  Until next time.

This weekend, we went back to the same Ultrasound clinic that we went to several weeks back, and splurged a little because we just can’t wait to see our little daughter’s face.  Thanks to some serious mathematics, processing power, and of course pure awesome physics, we can take a glimpse under our skin with a simple sound wave.  (If you seriously want to know more about the real-time rendering of the 3-D images for ultra sound, take a gander at this website.  Prepare to get your geek on.  You’ve been warned.)

I have to say I never expected the kind of emotional response that this experience elicited from me.  It’s as if I got to meet my daughter for the first time.  And I’ll be darned if that didn’t bring a tear to my eye.  I may be a little biased, but even looking at these distorted yellow images, I think she’s the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen.

Without further delay, click here, to go straight to the gallery.

Personally, I think she is a spitting image of Suzy.  Her eyes and nose for sure.  Suzy seems to think she resembles me from the lower lip down.  You be the judge:

I’ll post the video’s later when I can get them compressed and posted to YouTube.  Instead of the lullaby’s that were recorded with the original, I’m thinking of re-dubbing it (like a Kung-Fu movie).  I’ll taking requests for potential tunes.

Until next time, I love you all.

I know, I’m a giant slacker, I’ve been in Japan for a week and I haven’t uploaded any posts or photos or anything. Sorry internet… here’s a little something.

Just twelve hours on a plane is all it takes for me to get to one of the most amazing cities in the world. This is my second trip to Japan and I have to say it is just an incredible place. Everyone here is so polite, serious and happy all at the same time. At least that is what it appears from the outside. Tokyo is squeaky clean. The city is immaculate, safe, and awe inspiring. I have no problem walking the streets late at night – and feel 100% safe at all times. It’s an odd feeling for me, coming from the US where in a big city like this you would need to be careful which streets you strayed to at night, lest you be robbed, raped or killed. But here, in Tokyo, there is a sense of complete safety. Perhaps I am being naïve, but thus far everyone I have talked to feels the same way.

Being basically stuck in the center of Tokyo, next to the Imperial Palace, we really see nothing but prosperity. With everything that we hear the states about the struggling economy in Japan we see no evidence of this at all in this bustling metropolis. Expensive cars, business men in suits, super high-end brands everywhere. Today we traveled outside of Tokyo proper and into the suburbs to visit a customer outside the city. From the windows of the train, I can see seedy underbelly that most travelers do not get to see. I saw people living in makeshift houses made out of blue tarps and scraps of wood and metal. It’s not rampant, just occasional and very noticeable. It’s evident that the economy actually has impacted this country. I’ve got to hand it to the people of Japan – they hide it well.

My visit is bitter sweet, because, I am indeed here on business and we are working 90% of the time. This makes it pretty difficult to get out and sight see during the day. Fortunately, we did have an entire day to do some touristy things on Monday because of the local holiday here. But since then it’s been work, and meals, and back to the hotel. And to make matters worse, I picked up one of the local viruses which started with a fitful night with a stuffy head and sore throat. It’s been lingering throughout the week. It’s been hard to get out of bed in the morning, get the suit and tie on and go to work. I’ve been muddling through, but I can’t help but to long for my own bed back in the states.

Yesterday, we visited a customer in Yamato. One of the engineers that we work with took a couple of us to a bar in Yokohama called Cheers which is basically a beer bar that carries a wide selection of European beers. After sampling a few good Belgian and German beers, we moved onto another more intimate and, to me, more fascinating place. Our host led us to what appeared to be a multi-story apartment building. However, on the third floor, after climbing a tiny stairwell, we discovered the Thrash Bar (I am not completely sure about that name, but it was something to do with Thrashing). The bar was literally, only 10 ft. deep by 25 feet long. Enough room for the physical bar, and eight bar stools. They carried a pretty nice selection of Japanese beers and strangely enough a wide selection of California beers. Behind the bar was a TV playing DVD’s of German Heavy Metal bands, and our extremely friendly bar-tender who had a very good grasp of English. What a great beer-soaked evening it was; new friends and great times. I’ll definitely do this again, if I ever get the chance.

As you read this, I’m likely on my way home or have already returned. I’ve posted to photos in the gallery, here.

Sayonara for now.

Yesterday, Suzy and I bottled the beer. Yes, after two weeks of waiting anxiously, we opened fermenter and siphoned off the delicious liquid into a another large bucket which we used to finally bottle the beer. This part of the process has had me very nervous for the past two weeks. With so many variables, there are lots of opportunities for something to go wrong with the process.

After carefully extracting the fermenter from the bathtub, in an effort not to stir up any of the yeast residue clinging to the sides of the bucket, I slowly transferred it into the kitchen where the bottling was to take place. I lifted the heavy bucket up onto the counter, accidentally slammed the base against the counter-top, I cursed myself for not being careful enough. Probably not a big deal, I told myself. I stood for a moment mentally preparing myself for potential catastrophic beer failure. Then I began to crack the lid open. As I did this, a wonderful smell arose from the container. A sweet aroma, a bouquet of distinctly fresh… beer. There was no mistaking it – the process had worked. The smell and appearance of the liquid proved this a success.

I quickly hooked up the siphon and began transferring the beer into the second bucket with the priming sugar. After siphoning the beer into the second bucket, I was able to attach the bottling wand to the hose and spigot and begin the bottling process. At this point, I decided to actually taste the beer. Understand that at this point, it has just been mixed with the priming sugar, is still warm and of course, flat. However, I needed to know if the flavor was right. And thus, I poured out a shot glass worth of the liquid and lifted it to my lips. I emptied the container into my mouth, let is slosh around a bit, testing the flavor and finally swallowed. Success. Sweet success. Literally – definitely could taste the priming sugar. But at this point, it was definitely, beer. And quite tasty I might add.

And so we spent about an hour bottling the stuff up and transferred it to the bathtub again (mostly in case any bottles decide to explode). The fermentation is still in process and that priming sugar should generate some great carbonation to give it just the right mouth-feel. In two weeks, I’ll have a very drinkable beer – I hope. Wish me luck.

If you’ve looked over at the Gallery page, then you have likely noticed that my gallery thumbnails are totally busted. I’m currently in the process of transitioning my website from one server to another. Same hosting company, just an “upgrade” to the service. Apparently it has wreaked havoc on my gallery application – so please be patient while I attempt to “fix” this issue.

W/Love – The Admin.

UPDATE 1/28/2008: The system is up! I finally had some time to contact the StartLogic folks last night and we’re back in business. The gallery link is back and in working order.

Well, I’ve been really, really, really busy at work lately. I’ve spent the last two weekends in the lab, working for a good portion of the day. This is a rarity really, that I’m pulling 7-day weeks, with 12 hour days. But doggone-it, if I’m not getting burnt out. I wish we could just wrap this project up and move on. We’ve got other challenges to tackle and I can’t be burdened with this fire-fighting nonsense. Enough of that…

Upgraded to Ubuntu Gutsy Gibbon late last weekend and so far I am highly impressed. Lots of people are complaining that the fancy graphics (read: compiz) are a burden, but my system seems much snappier since the upgrade. All the software I regularly use has been updated to the latest and greatest versions and there are bug fixes galore. One important bug fix is the ability to do remote desktop with the desktop effects enabled. I’ve been taking full advantage of that feature, in fact, sitting on the couch as I type this VNC’ing from my laptop to my desktop. Beautiful. Gotta love free software.

My next challenge? I want to install DD-WRT on my Linksys router. Why do I want to do this? I want to have the ability to remote-terminal into my desktop at home from work. There are some times when it would be nice to have control of my desktop machine without having to physically go home (for example if I want to remotely shut down my bit-torrent client, eh-hem). Anyway, it looks really easy to do after reading through the wiki. That might have to be a project for next weekend.

Just received a copy of “Getting Things Done: The Art of Stress-Free Productivity” by David Allen. I read an article in Wired magazine recently about this guy who was once a meth-addict and is now being hailed as the new savior of business productivity. I just had to read this book. I’m going in with an open mind, but I will remain skeptical of “instant” results that it promises. Wish me luck. Maybe it will give me more time to write updates to the site.

How’s that for a disjointed post? It may be a while, but until next time…

I attended a great wedding this last weekend up in Beaverton, Oregon. Rick and Tuyen are now a united and happily married couple after five years of struggle to get Tuyen into the United States. It was a unique and really beautiful wedding, a bit of a western and Asian fusion type thing. I had a great time just seeing family come together and enjoy the day. Check out my pictures in the gallery here. And if you’re curious, click on through to the website I helped build for Rick and Tuyen prior to the wedding which also has a gallery. Congrats you two!