Sea Shanty Mocha Friday

January 15, 2021 by Adam in Family

I'm greatly heartened that sea shanties are back in style, with the Wellerman going viral on TikTok.  These are the things that are keeping me going through the rainy days of winter.  I've been spending my days writing code and moving data around, while the evenings are spent helping Ben with homework, doing chores, and watching shows.  Ben's been on a dessert-making spree, treating us yesterday with a tasty chocolate dish and later custard pie.  Plus he made dinner and caught up with math, all of which are appreciated.

We've got a three day weekend coming up.  Joanna's spending a couple nights in a cabin by herself to get away for a little.  I'll be wrangling Ben and Emma, probably through video games, movies, and generally hanging out.  Should be fun.

Sadness

January 12, 2021 by Seraph in Cortez

Our bunny Luna died this morning. We could tell she was sick when we got up this morning, but it progressed quickly. It's been tough for all of us. Even the dogs were uneasy all day. Isa and I filled a box with cedar, and Robbie and I burried her under an apple tree on the farm. 

Garden Beds

January 12, 2021 by Adam in Adam's Projects

Last weekend, Joanna put in a bunch of work getting the garden beds in.  We hauled dirt, spread sand from the old sandbox, and generally got things ready for planting again.  It was satisfying, one of those small victories in an otherwise hard year.  The beds have a gap of a foot or so of air between the beds and the ground, hopefully preventing roots from getting in and choking out the vegetables.  Here's hoping for the best.

RetroPie

January 08, 2021 by Adam in Adam's Projects

I asked for a Raspberry Pi for Christmas, which is a low-cost tiny computer that runs Linux and is used for all sorts of interesting projects, from weather stations to garden watering systems.  One thing people do with it is run old video games using emulators, and there's a well-known community to support it.  After mulling over options, I also bought a lift-top coffee table.  It took the duration of Monty Python's Holy Grail to assemble the thing, but it worked pretty well and nicely fit the old monitor and speakers I had laying around.

Yesterday I finally drilled holes for cables and finished putting it together.  Ben was my beta tester, playing old Atari games and a little Sonic before we had to stop and make dinner.

Back to Work

January 06, 2021 by Adam in Family

The kids went back to school yesterday and I had the day off.  I responsibly spent much of it doing practical things like taking down the Christmas ornaments and moving dirt into garden beds.  I still managed some video game time, playing through Cyberpunk 2077 and enjoying myself.  Ben made cream puffs, much to our enjoyment.  Data alternated mischeviously eating things he wasn't supposed to and sleeping in cute positions.  I'm a little envious.

New Year

January 04, 2021 by Adam in Family

After working for a couple days, my second big vacation of the season kicked off again.  For New Year's Eve we did our usual watching of Japanese boy bands and commercials, along with drinking virgin Piña Coladas.  Since then we've mostly been hanging out, occasionally accomplishing something useful.  Joanna continues putting in the new garden beds, with occasional help from myself and the neighbors.  Otherwise it's been lots of watching Star Trek DS9, video games, and the like.  Other than the final touches, I put together a video game coffee table for playing old video games.  Ben and Emma did a bit of homework.  Joanna survived another Costco run.

So far, 2021 is doing okay.

Web Services Reunion

December 29, 2020 by Adam in Adam

My old friend and coworker Dave organized a Zoom call with much of the old Web Services Team from my PeaceHealth days.  It was great to catch up with everyone, though vaguely terrifying how much older everyone's kids are now.  Time passes quickly.  I also heard through Kate that Kai is moving back to Eugene with her family.  I still remember Kate and Kai hanging out around the house with Seraph when I was twelve.

Back to Work

December 29, 2020 by Adam in Family

We had a pretty low-key Christmas weekend, slowly going through the tasty leftovers and playing with our assorted gifts.  Emma played way too much Ooblets, a cute game with little creatures you grow and engage in dance battles to build your menagerie.  The other big outing was going to visit Seraph and Robbie at my mom's farm.  Ben and Emma had a great time collecting things, returning with various water, plant, and mushroom samples and testing for pH, potassium, and so on.  Joanna really wants to have a little writer's cabin in the woods, so we started talking about it more earnestly.

I'm back to work, slowly remembering how to write code and interact with teammates.  It's another short week, so we'll see how much we actually get done in the next few days.

Honorable Emma

December 29, 2020 by Adam in Emma

Emma was accepted to Clark Honors College at the U of O.  She was excited to be accepted and we looked over the curriculum to see what the required classes were and what the program entails.  Between that and her merit scholarship, I think she's feeling pretty good about all her hard work.  Hopefully it's a clear indication that not only do her parents think she's awesome, but others do as well.

Cyberpunk 2077

December 27, 2020 by Adam in Adam's Games

Back in the 80s, Colin, Jason and I would play Cyberpunk 2020, which seemed like an impossibly far away future.  It was a pencil and paper RPG inspired by the early cyberpunk writers like William Gibson.  The RPG was updated, along with one of my favorite game studios coming out with a computer game.  Preorders were incredibly high, followed by backlash due to bugs.  Still, I've been really enjoying the world, the look of things, and the roleplaying through the stories.