Christmas Eve 2004

Here is a funny video of Anna on Christmas Eve 2004.


see it on YouTube.

I had to take the video off of YouTube... We sent the video in to Americas Funniest Home Videos, and they responded with a contract! So, it's looking good that they may actually use it!

A New Addition to the Family

The other night I brought home a new member to the family in a box in the back of my car.
Meet Rufus ...

Rufus had been settling in quickly.
Here he is joining us for a comfortable moment.

KT Tunstall Live from YouTube

I just heard this song on the radio this evening and had to check out the artist. Once I saw her perform this live and dynamically create the background music and vocals to sing with, then play the guitar and sing along with it, ... I was amazed. So, I immediately bought her "Eye To The Telescope" CD from Amazon.

Howto: use your PC and Webcam as a motion detecting / recording system

This tutorial will take you step-by-step through setting up your PC and Webcam to act as a motion-detecting and recording security camera system. And the software required to do this is open source (free)."

That didn't turn out as expected, however...

Well, the new pool didn't perform all that well. After 3-4 weeks in the hot sun the pool slouched to one side and stretched a seam until it split and started to leak! Good news is WalMart took it back. Bad news is it happened last week when the heat wave hit and we were without a pool. We had just enough taste of having a pool that we just had to get a replacement. So, we went shopping and found that the local Doughboy pool reseller beat most prices we found on-line. We bought the pool last weekend and today August 3rd it is being installed. Actually, as I'm typing this, they are filling the new pool making sure the liner doesn't wrinkle. Kind of an interesting approach they use to accomplish this.

Julie and I cut out the grass and leveled the area last weekend. They did the final leveling with a transit to check level. There was about a 1-1/2" slope across the area so they moved about 3/4" from one side to the other then recompacted it. They also smoothed the area nicely.



They quickly assembled the pool and stretched the liner over the top and slowly lowered it as the water filled. This kept the liner from wrinkling.



They marked a point to stop filling with some tape. This allowed them to finish installing the pump and skimmer the next morning.



Here Anna is seeing the pool for the first time. That evening after work we hurried home to check on the filling progress.



Julie and Anna posing with the pool the first evening it was installed.



The skimmer and filter are installed and we are filling the pool the rest of the way.



Julie quickly started putting in the new landscaping around the pool.



The pool is full and the landscaping work has started.

New Swimming Pool!

We bought a new swimming pool this last weekend, and quickly set it up. I had suggested we buy this above ground pool I spotted at WalMart, which was on sale for $130. We ended up waiting a week or so then the heat finally got to my wife and she decided it was a good idea. So, all excited we went to the store and bought it. Anna was really excited too. Setup was easy and it just fit in the small open yard area in the back. It is only 14 feed round and 42" deep but it sure is nice after a hot drive home to go jump into the pool to cool off. Anna would stay in the pool forever if we let her. We bought a lifejacket for her and one of us is in the pool with her at all times. She has been paddling around and playing until she is exhausted. At bed time she is wiped out and falls asleep almost immediately.

We Escape the Heat

It was so hot here this weekend that we escaped to Tahoe for a day at the beach. We went to Pope's Beach and brought a ice chest of good snacks, a beach umbrella, and a new floating lounge that Anna tried out for a moment. Most of the time was spent digging in the sand, building sand castles, then a mote that turned into a big pit she played in for a while.

Then we stopped in Truckee on the way home for dinner.

Camping Out (In The Backyard)

We have been telling Anna for several months that when the weather warmed up we would go camping out in our backyard. She couldn't wait and last night we decided the weather was warm enough and nice enough so we broke out the tent and sleeping bags and had a camp out. Scary stories by the camp fire (or in this case big flashlight), fun snacks, and star gazing, listening to the sounds of the night, then finally drifting off to sleep. Anna had a blast so I'm sure we'll have to do this again before the summer weather is gone.

Hazardous Month

Seems to be the month of road hazards. It started with me hitting a dear outside of Napa, CA. Then I heard that my neighbor was riding his motorcycle out of Lake Berryessa when a Turkey Vulcher flew right into him. Luckily, he managed to stay upright. Then my best friend since high school hit a dear while driving up to Tahoe. Tonight while driving home the car in front of me kicked up a large piece of truck tread and it hit my front grill, bending the plate and breaking the plate frame and breaking part of my front grill.

What's next!?

Alienware + Superman?!

Alienware has released a special edition Area 51 painted with the Superman Logo and matching color scheme. I like their add page more than the machine. I'd probably buy one of their higher end machines first. However I'm sure this one would be fine for most (more reasonable) people. I do like the machine but I can't help looking at the top of the line Aurora m9700 then adding more to it. I haven't been able to customize a computer from Dell or Alienware for years with out pushing $3000.00 by the time I've finished.

Killed A Deer

Last night while driving to my nephews high school graduation in Napa we were on Hwy 29 North outside of Napa just before the 121 turn off when out of nowhere a baby deer buck. I had just enough time to hit the breaks before we hit him with the right front of the car. Luckily we decided to take the larger vehicle and it was a small deer so, we suffered no injuries and little visible damage to the car. However the right headlight is broken and hanging out by the wires and the corner panel is pushed back so it interferes with the passenger door. The grill is cracked and it is one of those monolithic plastic pieces bumper grill and all. So, the whole thing will have to be replaced.

We made it to the graduation and dinner in Napa later but we did have to explain to my daughter that daddy killed a deer. She seemed to take it well sofar. We used it as an example of why we tell her not to run out in the street.

Google SketchUp

In the last few weeks I came across Google SketchUp. It looks like an easy to use 3D drawing program. I have had it installed for awhile but haven't found alot of time to play with it yet. The other night I went through the tutorial and looked at the quick start page. It seems pretty simple to use yet produces great looking 3D drawings. It really is like sketching with the mouse as far as simplicity. You are quickly rewarded with nice results too. The tutorial is short and worth the few minutes to go through it.

Open Source is Good!

I have come across several very good free open source programs on SourceForge.net

Audacity - Cross-Platform Sound Editor
Lame - MP3 encoder / transcoder
TrueCrypt - disk encryption software for Windows XP/2000/2003 and Linux (for a good description of TrueCrypt listen to SecurityNow episode #41 or read the transcripts)
GIMP - GNU Image Manipulation Program with features similar to PhotoShop
FileZilla - Fast FTP client and server
FreeNAS - NAS (Network Attached Storage) server with a Full WEB configuration interface. Fit on a 32MB Compact Flash or USB key.
7-Zip a file archiver with high compression ratio.

... and some I've been using for a while
DBAN Deriks Boot and Nuke - Secure harddrive erasure.
OpenOffice - Cross-Platform Office Suite

Another Fun Reference

The things you can find about yourself on Google. Here is a Sacramento Magazine photo of Julie, Anna and I that was published in the magazine February 2005 Sacramento Magazine

One of my Photos is being used.

I was just playing with Google Suggest and searched on my name. I found this reference to one of my public flickr photos being used. It looks like the Creative Commons license works because they did attribute the photo to me as required by the license. ;-)

http://www.43places.com

Well, it appears I just got lucky with my initial link. On return visits I've had to click on view more Photos then click on my photo. It's the one that looks like this.

Reference to Microsoft Atlas

I just fond this reference to Micosofts implementation of AJAX integrated with ASP.NET 2.0 Looks like it makes AJAX a snap to add to your site.

The Screening Room, episode 3: Atlas



The March episode of The Screening Room explores Microsoft's forthcoming AJAX toolkit, Atlas. This month's presenter is Shanku Niyogi. Our 25-minute interview will give you a good sense of Atlas as a browser- and server-independent framework, and also as an ASP.NET extender.
...

My Favorite Podcasts & Bloggs

Recently I found a new podcast (internet distributed audio similar to radio talks shows) which I though I would share with others. I added a list of bloggs and podcasts I have read or listened to, and liked to the left sidebar. Here are a few of the ones I follow:

MathGrad.com (podcast - Math concepts as they relate to every day life)
This Week in Tech (podcast - Latest in computers and technology)
Security Now (podcast - Computer & Network Security)
Sacramento Friends Church (blog - Quaker / Meeting of Friends)
Buffalo Chips News (blog - Running Club)

Update:
FLOSS Weekly - (podcast - Open Source software)

NOD32's Antivirus

I have recently dropped Symantec Norton antivirus on my home computers in favor of ESET's NOD32 Antivirus. I had heard and read some reviews stating that it was faster and lighter weight so it didn't have the effect of slowing your computers performance like Symantec's Norton antivirus does.

After running it for a while now I can say it definitely does not impact the computers performance like Norton AV did. I have always had little annoying problems with Norton AV and I haven't see any of those with NOD32. At this point I'd recommend NOD32 over Norton AV.

Flicker Photos

I have posted lots of new photos on my flickr site http://www.flickr.com/photos/hcriswell/ over the last several weeks. Though most are viewable only if you have been invited and login. Typically I have sent invitations to family and friends.

Care and Handling of Credit and Personal Information

Despite the real and present dangers Internet Identity Thefts, Phishing and email scam attacks pose, we cannot afford to overlook measures we can take to protect our identities and credit from attacks in the real (physical) world.

Financial institutions, law enforcement agencies and attorneys recommend a number of ways you can protect against credit card theft and misuse, check fraud, and unintentional disclosure of personal information that can be used by impersonators, extortionists and other malicious or malevolent persons. A short list of some of these follows..

Anna's Painting

The weather was great today so we went for a bike ride. Anna had her 4th birthday 2 days ago and yesterday she painted this great picture with mom.

My neighbor is talking about doing a triathlon in June. I'm thinking it would be fun to train for a short sprint course Triathlon. It would be nice to cross train with biking and swimming added to the running.

I posted several new photos to my flickr site. Only a few are visable to the general public but if you have been invited to join my flickr site you can join flickr and see all 159 photos.

Burning It Up

I've been down since the start of last weekend with a fever hovering around 102-103. Saturday and Sunday the fever was steady and nothing seemed to bring it down. Then Monday it started to subside during the day and spike in the evening. The worst thing is I think my little girl has caught the same bug / virus. It is almost inevitable that my wife will eventually get it too.

Sitting at home with chills and being tired all day is pretty boring. I hope to recover soon and be back to normal health, running, working, eating, etc.

Run it is

Matt and I have been getting out to run 3 days during the week and we are planning on getting out once this weekend. So, I guess we did get back into a good training pattern again.

I have started the setup of a wireless network for my church. I have the main router configured and three computers setup to access the secured network. Next phase is to put a high gain antenna outside to broadcast the signal to the neighboring building. Then I'll survey the signal range and strength to see where I need to put boosters in to get the coverage to all the areas we need it. This will allow sharing of printers and a central storage / backup area for the other computers on the network. We will also have access to a database that tracks the books in our library.

Sleep or Run

I've been a little flake lately when it comes to getting out the door to meet my neighbor for the morning run. I've missed two days sofar. I have been bussy finalizing my church's books for 2005 so I can hand off the treasurership to another volunteer, however I should pace my self and not stay up so late. Then I'd have an easier time getting out the door in the mornings.

My wife has been working out on her heavy bag in the garage, so I have been joining her out there and working out with my weights and stretching. I hope this will help some when I do get back out the door to run.

New Years Eave

We had an exciting New Years Eave this year! The toilet seal in the guest bathroom was leaking causing the floor to swell. So to prevent further damage I spent the day tearing out the floor and replacing it and putting new linoleum down, re-doing the base boards, caulking, putting the sink and toilet back in.

I did take a 5 minute break to watch the ball come down in New York then it was back to work.

I did manage to squeeze in a short run with Matt on Sunday after church, though it was so windy we were being pelted with flying debris and the rain had flooded most of the trail by the river.

I finally finished getting it all back together last night. Good thing I had Monday off so I could have one day to relax.