Fancy Friday, or: The importance of the Team Lunch

I don’t often eat lunch at work. Its not a cash grab, or anything, I just found that I prefer eating once daily. So, often, I miss time that I could be bonding with my team because I’m sitting behind my terminal fixing things.

We’re situated in the heart of Baltimore, so our lunch options are many. Most of the restaurants are a bit on the pricey side, as they’re places like Ruth’s Chris, and Capitol Grille, etc. Interestingly enough, most of these places have CHEAP lunch specials (in comparison to their normal menus, of course…). Today, we went to Capitol Grille, and I had a Filet Salad. It was $21, but worth it.

We work in a hectic environment. Most of us sit within 10 feet of the other team members, yet are specifically charged with sitting close and interacting with loads of people that aren’t the ones in our immediate vicinity. It’s been so nice outside, and eating a good meal with your team really helps to build relationships.

Completely unrelated note, the blogging client I’ve been using, PixelPumper, is pretty good, but doesn’t support dragging and dropping images. Have you ever heard of such an oversight?

Color Run Jitters

I’m getting the pre-run jitters for this Color Run. 

Its a 5k, and Laura and I ran 3.04 last night. I shouldn’t be worried.

Whats intriguing to me is that I badly want to take my camera (were it that I had a Go Pro!), but I’m torn between wanting pictures and being worried that everything will be covered in cornstarch-color-powder. I’m more worried about my shoes than anything, they’re going to be multicolored for quite a while, I’d guess.

Back to the gym soon. Will feel good to have an accessory program (for knee strength and hamstring mobility) to go with my heavy lifts.

PixelPumper… What a name!

So, after downloading ANOTHER WordPress desktop publishing app for OSX (and hoping for the best), I’m going to give this a shot. You can try it here in this link to the Apple App Store. 

I’ve been doing some good work on the site. Really mapping things out. I want to do a wood-block transfer for my garden, and transfer a picture that says “Marvin Gardens” to my actual garden. Suppose I should get the planter box built first. Dan brought up an interesting point, about the sides bowing out. I hadn’t considered that they’d do that. Maybe I’ll lay the gravel layer and see how things go. I’m reading more about tomatoes, and I’m almost certainly over-watering. Must make sure to dial that back… In addition, I’m thinking just an inch of gravel, so that I can have a nice, very deep bed for the garden. I hope to get the tomatoes on one side, zucchini on the other (as they tell me that its a fairly aggressive plant… maybe even I can grow it!) and, if all goes well, try to find a Kiowa blackberry bush to plant. 3″ fruit from Kiowa blackberry bushes, can you believe that?

Must register for my next race. Vince and Carlie are doing the Savage Race 2013 in July, but I’m still torn. I might need to find some less expensive endeavors to fill my time until this fall. 

Pixelpumper seems nice, although the (apparent) complete lack of keyboard shortcuts is, at least, disconcerting, and at most, a deal breaker.

Microcontrollers, and Where do I Start

I’m looking at Arduino Microcontroller Boards, like I mentioned yesterday. They seem to be the biggest source of “I have no idea how to do any sort of electrical engineering, and I need to start somewhere.” Interestingly enough, it seems like there are plenty of options to lay out my schematics, and APPARENTLY, CircuitLab is a thing… Huge site, chrome plugin, and all. Time to get some schematics cranking.

Now for something different… QTM?

So I wrote earlier about Windows Live Writer… I’m slightly ashamed to say that it actually rocks.

I really enjoy MarsEdit for OSX, but I can’t stomach paying $40 for it. Comments.app is a new contender, and at $4.99 for it might be reasonable, if this QTM app doesn’t pan out.

I’m watching Hell’s Kitchen and attempting to figure out how I’m going to use subversion for my laundry-sensor. The laundy sensor will be the first step towards my own home-automation. I need to get there first!

Must purchase the arduino first. I think Makeshed has one that has the ethernet shield built in. I can’t tell if using ethernet will be more beneficial. The long term plan is for 802.1X in the home, and authenticated 1X with LDAP integration on a dedicated debian VM… If 1X is in the future for wireless auth at the house, I think that ethernet should be preferred. Perhaps I’ll think on it. I need to restructure the site here. More thoughts tomorrow.

Minimal Shoes, Maximum Run Times

So, I’m writing this post from Windows Live Writer, and it bears striking resemblance to Office 2010. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised by that. I’ve cleaned up the site, removed some things, and will be adding my projects.

Couple of things have happened since my last update. I’ve torn my meniscus, and had it repaired. I’ve lifted my maxes and hurt my knee again. I’ve entered physical therapy. My shoes (some new balance horribly grey shoes) had in excess of probably 350 miles on them, not to mention countless gym hours, and I’d been eyeing up the New Balance MT00BG’s for some time. They are minimal, and very light weight. In my first run on them last night (just 2 miles) I feel great. No pain!

I hope to be able to get the garden box in this weekend, assuming I’ll have the free time. I need to get the grass mowed, get the Thankful Paws site updated with the info provided. Now that I think about it, the Baltimore Color Run is this weekend, so that’ll fill up Sunday into the early afternoon. After a race, brunch is always necessary.

I keep meaning to order a donut pan and cutter. I have too many recipes to try. I need to listen to Pimsleur, make donuts and cut the grass at the same time. I’m not certain, but if I wasn’t so concerned with the look of my lawn, I’d hire someone to do it. The time investment is great, and its taking up some time that I could likely use for other, more creative endeavors.

So, lets go over this, for posterities sake. Donuts. Grass mowing. Arduino project layout. Gardening. Running. Physical Therapy.

So much to do. Hope to write soon!