Jim’s Brain Online

Posted by Jim at April 29th, 2005

Though you certainly don’t want kids taking weapons into school, I think that things may have gone too far in the other direction.

School Mistakes Huge Burrito for a Weapon

Posted by Jim at April 28th, 2005

All that remains for the bathroom to be done is touch up work. Touch up work in this case means:

–Removing a thin haze of grout from the tile
–Repairing the broken plaster
–Putting a removeable cover over the bathtub’s plumbing instead of the immoveable covering (except by destruction) that the last owners left

This leaves me in a position to meditate a little bit on the process of doing the project. Here are some things that I have learned:

Research the Whole Project
The goal of this project was to put up tile in the bathroom and take out the tub surround. That part of the project was researched well. Kristen even went to a class on laying tile at one point. Unfortunately we were too tile focused. In our plans the project looked like this:

1. Take down the tub surround and put up the concrete backerboard.
2. Put up the tile.

Here’s what it should have looked like:

1. Rip out the tub surround.
2. Use crowbar to remove the plaster and the lathe (thin boards that hold up plaster) behind it.
3. Put up shims so that the concrete backerboard will be level when you screw it in. This step took two days. It also involved putting up an additional 2 by 4 behind the tub, lots of measuring, and lots of cutting.
4. Put in a new mixing valve for your hot and cold water. Your old one is 20 years old and it already leaks. If you leave it in and knock it a few times during the construction process, you’ll end up putting in a new one anyway. It’ll just be more expensive if you wait.
5. Put in plastic sheeting behind backerboard.
6. Screw in concrete backerboard.
7. Put up mortar.
8. Put up tile. This also included a lot of measuring and cutting.
9. Put in grout.
10. Brush on sealer.

We had planned for everything but step 2, 3 and 4. We were only saved from disaster by happenstance which led to another insight I’ll call…

Do Not In Fact Actually Do Do-It-Yourself Projects Yourself
After ripping out the tub surround, I realized that there was a lot of drywall and plaster behind it. At that point I had to decide whether to rip that out or to just screw in the backerboard over it. Unfortunately I’m not particularly experienced in such things.

When I’m not experienced, my first instinct is to do research. That’s what you do when you’ve spent as much time in academia as I have. Research in this case consisted of calling people I know who have done significant amounts of home repair. One of them turned out to be David Bosch who I knew worked in renovating old homes. I didn’t know precisely what he did though. It turned out that he’s a carpenter.

I can’t tell you how important that turned out to be.

I wouldn’t have known to put up the 2 by 4 for support. I would have had no idea how to make the backerboard level. I wouldn’t have had the necessary tools. He knew or owned all of the above. Better than that, he was willing to spend more than 20 hours over the course of 3 days hanging out in our bathroom, instructing me in the basics of carpentry, and just doing the stuff that was in any way beyond me (i.e. nearly everything).

Along the same lines, my Mom came in and taught Kristen how to lay tile, putting in much of the mortar and tile herself.

Construction Leads You Into Odd Situations
Beyond the simple fact that we didn’t get to bathe for a couple days, the oddest situation resulted from the placement of the bathroom.

Our bathroom is on the second floor of our house. Just off of the bathroom is a balcony. We needed to cut concrete backerboard, shims, 2 by 4’s, and tile. Where did we cut them? On the balcony.

If you had told me that people would be operating power tools in the dark on my balcony, I don’t know what I would have done, but I hope I would have bought more lighting.

Brief Note to Those Who May Someday Sell Me Insurance: I solemnly pledge to never ever do it again. On the bright side, at least we weren’t also drinking beer.

Know When to Stop
You’ve got two competing needs when doing home renovations. First you’ve got to do everything needed to do a good job. Second, you have to know when to stop.

Take on too much and you’ll end up living in construction until you have the urge to finish–possibly years from now.

We could have ripped out the other walls in the bathroom too. The paneling is cheap and somewhat bad looking, but we just aren’t going to do it soon. Maybe during the summer we’ll consider it, but if we have any sense we won’t do it till next summer.

Dave knows a couple whose marriage was pushed towards divorce due to home renovations. Kristen and I want to avoid that.

Conclusion
One amusing result of all this is that tools and home repair actually seem interesting to me now. I’m one step closer to understanding why my grandfather actually did it for fun.

I think it’d be more fun to work on someone else’s home though. That way I’d still be able to bathe.

So if David ever needs a clueless person to hold boards in place while he works on his own house, I’m available…

Posted by Jim at April 27th, 2005

Kristen and went out to shop for a cousin’s wedding shower on Friday night.

Desperate for food, we also went to Thai House (6447 28th St Se, Grand Rapids, MI 49546). Our motivation for going was partially because we’d been curious about Thai House and partially because it wasn’t far from Bed, Bath and Beyond.

I haven’t been to a lot of Thai restaurants. Before this, the only other Grand Rapids’ Thai restaurant I went to was “Bangkok View” (which I like).

I’d describe Thai House’s decor as “strip mall storefront with tables and some ethnic stuff.” It’s a nice looking place, but they aren’t really investing in decorations. That’s probably just fine as the food is quite good.

We ended up bringing our kids along and that worked out pretty well. The waitress made an effort to entertain them, made sure that their portion of the meal arrived quickly (we ordered them satay–marinated chicken on skewers), and even allowed them to choose candy from a large basket of candy at the end of the meal.

We ordered one of the two person meals that combines soup, spring rolls, and two main dishes. The main dishes consisted of a chicken dish in what might have been a soy based sauce and a pork and green pepper curry in what was definitely red curry and coconut milk. Kristen seemed pretty sure that I’d made the pork and green pepper curry at some point.

I think she may be right, but I’m not sure. I’ve made a fair amount of Thai food at home, but I don’t keep track of which recipes. In this case, I think I’ve made a version that used chicken instead of pork.

Thai House had one thing that I hadn’t ever noticed before–”Hot Ginger Tea.” As a person who is irrationally curious, I decided to order it. The waitress looked at me, paused, and asked me “Have you ever ordered this before?”

I’m guessing that non-Thai customers generally don’t order “Hot Ginger Tea.”

She brought out a small cup of it for me to taste. Here’s what I discovered: It definitely clears the sinuses. It smells like a tea made out of ginger (i.e. strong). It tastes pretty good though–if you like ginger. Don’t expect sugar. It’s not available.

After I indicated that I liked it, she brought out a small pot.

The food that I had there seemed less sugary than I’ve gotten at “Bangkok View,” making me wonder if “Bangkok View” might be catering to western tastes a little more. On the other hand, Thai recipes that I’ve made also sometimes include a fair amount of sugar. It may be that we just ordered food that doesn’t have much. We’ll know more if we go back more often.

We’re likely to do that.

Posted by Jim at April 24th, 2005

After Christmas I used some of the money I recieved to purchase books. It says something about how busy my life is at the moment that I (who sometimes read 15 books a month during high school) still haven’t finished the 8 books I bought in late December/early January.

According to the book cover, Armor is a “military science fiction classic.” I can’t say whether or not that’s true as a I don’t generally seek out military science fiction or military fiction in general. It’s not that I have something against it, it’s just that I don’t make any special effort to look for it.

Armor follows two stories. First the story of Felix, a new recruit to hopeless, desperate war. Second, the story of Jack Crow, a person with a certain moral flexibility who is trying to leave the backwater colony he’s stuck on.

Initially, you don’t realize that there’s more than one story being told. It starts with a limited third person perspective from Felix’ point of view. That goes on for the first 100+ pages or so. When it changes to Jack’s first person narration, you might find yourself wondering if it’s the same book.

It is.

Though I’m not going to go into details, the two stories interlock. The book could have just stuck to Felix, making the entire novel about his personal experience of the war. It would have been a good novel because the author does a great job creating the experience of fear and the personal distance you’d have to have from your experience to come out of combat reasonably sane. Not to mention his ability to make the descriptions of combat thrilling to read without glorifying it. The characters feel solid to me–human, flawed and sometimes heroic. In short, the book could have been Starship Troopers complete with powered armor and insect opponents, but with a more negative slant to war.

It’s a smarter book than that.

The second story in the book is set later in the war, after Felix’ part of the story. Jack Crow’s story involves finding out what happened to Felix as well as opening up the colony he’s on to a pirate /deserter named Borglyn.

The author does a great job of depicting the relationships of the characters as well as creating a plot that moves the story along. Along the way, the story also asks questions about the morality of fighting and a person’s duty to others.

I recommend the book. I enjoy books in which the characters aren’t perfect people, doing things that they will later regret, and experiencing the results of those actions. I enjoy books in which the characters experience more than they can handle.

This is one of them. Take that as you will.

Posted by Jim at April 21st, 2005

As I mentioned in an earlier post, I had to fix a problem someone was having with Microsoft Outlook.

Well, I finally figured out the solution. This is good because Microsoft never did call back.

Here’s the problem: You’re supposed to be able to click on the “To:” button when you’re writing a new email in Outlook and then see a list of all the people in your address book. Unfortunately, this was not happening. The list clearly existed because a scroll bar was there, but you couldn’t actually see anything. Clicking where a name normally would be didn’t make anything visible.

Interestingly, the same problem occurred when you opened the address book in Outlook, but if you resized the address book all the names appeared. Of course, the dialogue that appears when you press “To:” does not resize–no chance of an easy workaround there. Worse, the lack of an address book makes Outlook useless.

When I called Microsoft, technical support led me through the process of making Outlook recognize the path to the email file and then to the address book within that file. I was leary of this approach as it seemed obvious to me that it was some sort of problem with the part of the program that handled the graphic user interface.

We’ll never know for sure because of the nature of the solution:
Upgrade to the most recent Office XP service pack.

People might reasonably ask why I didn’t think of that immediately. I’ve been kicking myself on that one for much of the afternoon. It’s generally one of the first things I try.

It’s a basic rule of system administration. If something doesn’t work, upgrade to the most recent version and try again. Remember it. It will save you some time.

That assumes, of course, that you don’t manage to completely screw up your system in the process.

Posted by Jim at April 20th, 2005

Around a year ago now, a few of my friends did blog entries that involved listing the next 10 randomly chosen songs on your mp3 player/mp3 library. I didn’t have one at the time and thus didn’t participate.

At the moment, I do, and have been ripping albums to my pc regularly for a while now. Thus this list of the next 10 randomly chosen songs:

Led Zeppelin: “Going to California” from Led Zeppelin IV
I’m undoubtedly one of the millions that happen to have this album (it’s got “Stairway to Heaven” on it).

Fiona Apple: “Criminal” from Tidal
Fiona Apple is one of the many artists I like but haven’t bought anything they’ve done. This is free from Apple’s online music store.

Charles Earland: “Westbound #9″ from Living Black
Charles Earland was a great Jazz organist who was based in Chicago. I’ve seen him live. He was incredible and now unfortunately dead. He was also highly admired by Ray Manzerak of the Doors.

Benny Carter: “Back Bay Boogie” from Wicked Swing
Classic Jazz.

Gigli Pinza Caniglia Stignani: “Lacrymosa” from Verdi Requiem
My wife got this. She may have sung in a production of it.

The Mighty Mighty Bosstones: “Illegal Left” from Don’t Know How to Party
The Mighty Mighty Bosstones come out of the Ska revival of the 90’s. I like them.

Louis Armstrong: “Hello Dolly” from “The Essential Louis Armstrong”
More classic (and in this case quite popular) Jazz.

Pat Methany: “Not to be Forgotten (Our Final Hour)” from Secret Story
I find this entire album rather creepy sounding, but it is good. Pat Methany’s a Jazz guitarist and composer.

John Lee Hooker: “Good Rockin’ Mama” from Boom Boom and Other Hits
Classic blues.

Ben Folds Five: “Where’s Summer B?” from Ben Folds Five
I don’t like this album as much as “Whatever and Ever Amen,” but I still like it.

Living Colour: “Flying” from Collideoscope
Living Colour was a hard rock band from the late 80’s and early 90’s. They had a few hit songs on their first two albums (”Glamor Boys,” “Cult of Personality,” and “When Love Rears It’s Ugly Head”). This song is from their most recent album. They got back together in 2003 or 2004. I’m not sure if they’re still together, but I’m betting not.

Well, there we go. Only a year or more later, I’ve finally responded. I can’t say that this is a completely accurate sample of my musical interests, but it’s as good as 10 songs can be.

Posted by Jim at April 19th, 2005

I’ve been allowed another semester to finish my master’s project. This is a good thing. This way it will be the project I want it to be rather than the projext I’d have handed in next week.

You can bet you’ll be hearing more about it in the near future.

Posted by Jim at April 17th, 2005

As a clueless undergraduate, I majored in religion, later adding a sociology major and attending seminary for a couple years. Beyond learning that I should not become a minister, I came to appreciate various styles of music and worship.

Once on my own, I eventually joined a Christian Reformed church whose worship style can best be described as eclectic. It includes Calvinist theology, an odd mixture of music (traditional hymns, praise choruses, hymns from other parts of the world and music written by members of the congregation), and a liturgy closely descended from the Orthodox/Roman Catholic/Episcopalian branch of worship.

Sometimes the music amuses me more than it ought to. Today for example we sang a hymn that included the following phrases:

Tell the grim, demonic chorus, “Christ is risen, get you gone”

There just aren’t enough hymns in which you get to sing the phrase, “grim, demonic chorus.”

UPDATE: Oh, and while I’m at it, I’ll also provide a link to one of the cheesiest hymns I have ever encountered (though not at my church). It’s called “The Royal Telephone.” Its a great example of how to take an inoffensive metaphor (the telephone as prayer) and drive it into the dirt through overuse.

Its my hope that I never encounter a hymn that likens any part of a Christian’s experience of God to the internet in any way. My suspicion is that I would find it aesthetically painful.

Posted by Jim at April 16th, 2005

If you’ve been alive long, you’ve had these moments. You know which ones I mean. The moments where you’re walking along, living your life and something happens and everything changes. It could be an accident. It could be hearing about a loved one’s death. It could be anything.

Far too much of parenthood consists of avoiding these moments or teaching your children to avoid them.

It’s far this reason that I don’t much like parking lots or crossing busy streets. Here I’ve got to do two things simultaneously:

1. Keep the kids safe. This is more of a challenge now that not only can Abby and Rebecca walk, but they can also run. They don’t necessarily want to have their hands held and they definitely don’t want to be carried into the store. They’re also getting heavy enough that I don’t really want to carry them.

2. Teach the kids how to safely navigate such things by themselves. This means injecting a healthy fear of cars into them as in, “Walk, don’t run in the parking lot. Look both ways for cars because they aren’t looking for you.” At the same time, I don’t want to inject too much fear as I’ve noticed that sometimes Abby sees a car and bolts forward, not necessarily looking where she’s going. That’s the exact opposite of what I’m trying for.

As far in the future as it seems now, I’m someday going to have to trust them to cross streets by themselves. In some ways I’ll be happy when that happens, but what new worries will I have to replace the old? It’s a natural process, an inevitable one, and, overall, a good one.

But we’re not there yet, and, we won’t be for a while.

Posted by Jim at April 13th, 2005

Every so often in the course of doing Windows system administration you end up calling Microsoft. My experience with MS tech support ranges from good to not so good.

The good experience occurred in 1997 when my parents bought me a copy of Word 97 for Christmas. It wouldn’t install. I called technical support (for free) and they told me how to solve the problem.

Fast forward to 2004: Last year I had to call them with a server licensing issue. They moved me back and forth between 2 departments at least twice before one of them decided they actually had the power to solve the problem.

Today: I called them today and stayed on the phone with them for 4 hours. During this time they tried little more than I’d already tried myself, put me on hold to discuss the problem with other people at the call center, and finally told me that they didn’t know how to solve the problem. They’ll call me back tomorrow.

Did I mention that Microsoft moved their call center to India? So there’s also the added accent barrier. Not to mention the fact that I don’t always enunciate as well as I might, making things a little more difficult for them.

Things that made the experience particularly special:
1. The way the call got cut halfway through the process.
2. Starting from scratch with a new person.
3. The time spent on hold was literally long enough for me to fall asleep. Imagine waking in your boss’ chair, phone embedded in your ear, to an Indian accented voice saying, “Hello? Jim? Hello? Jim?”
4. I spent four hours of my life talking about Microsoft Outlook. I will never get that time back.
5. Microsoft tech support now costs $35 per incident–except for development related incidents. Then it’s $245.