Fri - August 10, 2007

Tue - August 7, 2007

Group time

Some days are easier than others.

It's easier dropping off James at daycare in the morning if his classmates are in the middle of some group activity. At other times, I have to hand him off to one of his teachers whom he finds particularly soothing. Otherwise, if it's not group time, or if that particular teacher is unavailable (usually with her hands full with other kids), it can be a little hard, with James crying for me.

His outfit in the photo has clownfish and sea turtles. Not officially "Finding Nemo" but pretty obviously tied to the story, and it's a favorite of his now.

Posted at 11:29 PM    

Sun - August 5, 2007

Weekend update

Decommissioning an iMac, a party, and more swimming...

We got the iMac G4 (800 MHz) back in 2002, really in preparation for William's birth. We also got a miniDV camcorder at the time. The idea was that we'd be using the iMac, camcorder, and digital camera to document William's life from birth. iMovie, iPhoto, etc.

The iMac has served me well in the years since. I also had a separate Power Mac G4, which I later replaced with a Power Mac G5. I wanted to use the Power Mac(s) for work-related projects, or hobby projects or games, and I'd keep personal and family stuff segregated on the iMac. That way, if I hosed the drives on the Power Mac for whatever reason, things like family photos or family finances (Quicken and TurboTax are on the iMac) would be protected.

While the iMac has served quite well, in the past year I've noticed that it's starting to struggle with recent software and the load of media files I've put on it. The original 60 GB hard drive is insufficient to hold both my iPhoto library and my iTunes library, so I offloaded the iTunes library to an external FireWire drive. With my growing iPhoto library, however, I've now got only about 6 or 7 GB of free space left on the internal drive, and much of that often gets sucked up with swap space.

This highlights the real limitation of the iMac -- memory. The iMac RAM is maxed out at 768 MB. Later models could handle more, but being an early adopter (and racing against the impending birth of William to get stuff in order), we got one of the first models of the iMac G4.

For what I've been using the iMac G4 for, the old 800 MHz PowerPC G4 processor should be more than adequate -- e-mail, web surfing, web page building, photos, music, and the occasional iMovie. However, certain applications in their most recent incarnation suck up huge amounts of RAM -- I'm thinking of iWeb specifically -- and when 768 MB isn't enough, Mac OS X starts using swap space on the hard drive, which just makes things unbearably slow.

There are some things that the iMac can't handle. Some data analysis that I bring home can take up huge amounts of memory and CPU resources, for which I happily use the Power Mac G5. Also, iMovie HD (which I use with the new Canon HV20 camcorder) can't run adequately on the iMac, so I've switched movie editing to the Power Mac G5 as well. The iMac G4 also doesn't have USB 2 (just USB 1.1), so I've had to sync my new iPhone on the Power Mac G5 also.

So, last week, I came to the conclusion that the few remaining things I do on the iMac G4 I can and will do comfortably on the Power Mac G5. Plus, I'm comfortable enough with my backups as well as the stability of the Power Mac G5 itself that I'm less concerned about segregating family stuff. (That said, I'm still worried that the liquid-cooling on the G5 may eventually give way, so I'll be extra careful to keep my backups in order.)

Friday night, I backed up the iMac G4 internal hard drive twice, to two separate external FireWire hard drives, and I began transferring files and applications to the Power Mac G5. I even made DVD archive copies of the iMac hard drive. Then, I deauthorized the iMac on iTunes, and I unsynchronized it from .Mac.

A lot of work. My office is a mess... or at least messier than it was last week.

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We went to a birthday party today, after Mass. William likely won't be seeing many of these friends any more in a few weeks, when he goes off to kindergarten. The party was at Griffith Park near LA, and the kids rode the antique merry-go-round there.



While at the party, Hsuan was in conversation with a friend whose child was formerly at our daycare center. She commented that tuitions at our daycare are now so high that it's unaffordable to much of the Pasadena community.

Given that I'm primarily responsible for setting tuitions, it's something that I'm painfully aware of. Unfortunately, in the years I've been doing the job, I've seen how efforts to keep the school "affordable" have often made it impossible for the school to make payroll or pay its bills. For now, our tuitions are necessary just to keep the school running. Maybe I and the rest of the Board will think of a way to enhance our affordability in the 18 months or so left in my term of office.

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After the party, William and I went swimming for a couple of hours or so. After swimming, William rode his bike for a while. It was a very nice, sunny day today. (William also went swimming yesterday. After we noticed some chips in the plaster in the pool, I let Hsuan bring William and James into the spa while I mixed up some pool putty and fixed the plaster in the main pool...)

Posted at 11:18 PM    

Wed - August 1, 2007

Numb3rs, and My Gym

Sort of getting work done, at work.

Crews were on campus all day today, filming Numb3rs. They're on campus so often that it's almost getting to be old hat, and I'm less likely to gawk than I used to be. (It's sort of like seeing Stephen Hawking on campus, zooming around on his wheelchair. He comes every year, almost.)

I've been getting work done at the office. Mostly code. I also plan on doing some hardware work in the lab later.

Merav O., an old friend and former JPLer, was visiting today. She's now a physics professor on the east coast -- tenure track, and struggling to get funding (as are we all, even those of us not professors). She's here mainly to talk to Ed, but she had lunch with me and Mark.

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Brought William to My Gym after work. While William did his thing with his friends, James played with blocks and other toys.

Posted at 11:47 PM    

Sat - July 28, 2007

Best day of swimming

Warm afternoon.

William and I stayed home while Hsuan brought James to My Gym, and then afterward (and after a late breakfast), we caught an 11:30 AM showing of the Simpsons movie. Hilarious. Stay for the ending credits.



At around 2 PM or slightly after, William and I went swimming. I much prefer swimming during the day, while it's warm. At night or early evening, there's often enough of a breeze that it feels very cold when we get out of the pool.

During our couple of hours or so in the pool, William swam 14 laps (not all at once). This is the most swimming he's done this summer. His confidence in the water is very high, and his swimming skills are improving noticeably. One huge benefit to all this swimming is that, afterward, his appetite is triple what it would be if he didn't swim. When we swim in the evenings, I make sure it's before he has dinner. Now, either he eats three times what he would otherwise eat, or at least he eats the same amount with no coaxing or pushing from me or Hsuan for him to eat his dinner. He digs right in.

I can almost see him growing taller and stronger. (Genetics wins out -- he's as thin as I was at his age.)

After swimming in the pool, William and I usually retire to the spa for more relaxation and hotter water. For the first time, we brought James into the spa with us. James was very scared at first, and he clung to me very tightly. Eventually, he stood on the raised seat on his own, near the waterfall, but he got scared whenever William's antics caused big waves.

I assume he peed while I was holding him, too. He always pees in the bathtub.

After our swim, we all went to Chili's for dinner. William and I were particularly hungry. Then we went to Barnes and Noble for a bit after dinner.

Posted at 12:30 AM