I also stopped at Duncan doughnuts and got a dozen dougnuts and bagels.. and a box of coffee. I got to the EMC (Emergent Media Center) expecting one or two of the folks to be there. I was so happy to find a pretty biug crowd. Ann had actually invited soem more folks.. and lots of them showed up.

There was Tony-the-perfectionist-artist

Bryan-the crazed-programmer

Ray-the-bossman

Laura-queen-off-the-Flash

Max-who-is-not-a-dog

Mike-the-sleep-deprived-artist-and-techno-DJ

Alex-the-profeesor (I think he looks liek a wise professor.. don’t you ?)

Awesome-the-kendo-fighting-producer (Actually Allison.. but I thought she said her name was awesome and it stuck)

Iain-the-pizza-guy

We geared up and worked all day.. It was really, really, really wonderful teamwork. These kids are so incredibly talented and creative. It’s a real pleasure to be workign with them. I’m leanring so much. The atmosphere was great.. actually the atmosphere was hot and steamy.. we were working so hard it started to get really stuffy in there. At one point this morning I walked into the room and announced that I was having more fun at that moment than I’d had at work since….  uh.. since…. maybe forever.. I really meant it.. now I should  really think about what that means.  

By noon everything I’d brought to eat was gone. I snuck out for pizzas and more caffeine..   We got a break on the Pizza since Iain works for Dominos.. Thanks Iain, thanks Dominos!

By about 5:30 we were all getting pretty tired.. I had to leave.. but soem of the team stayed and kept working.. It looks by therei upload logs that some of them were there past 8 !. They are so friggin amazing to work with. We got a ton done today.. any we start again at 9 AM tomorrow !

I got home just in time to feed Chai meet up with Diane and head off to our friends Tom and Beth’s house. We were meeting our other freinds Rona, Paula and their son Pat  there for a potluck. It was great hanging out with all of those guys. We did a bunch of tlaking about our lives… It’s been only a month since Tom and Beth’s daugheter Kate died. I remember so clearly where my head was a month after Sam’s deth. I know how good it was to have folks to tlak to.. It was a great evening.

I found a goofy picutre of Tom from a few years back. I love it.

Here’s beth with an article in the Essex newspaper about Kate..

It was 11:30ish when we started for home.. Diane found this poster near their back door.. Hey.. maybe it’s not too late !

Gabe was home waiting for us with 4 friends over for a sleep over. They all want to get up on the mountain around 8L30…. We’ll soo how that goes.. they were still eating dinner at midnight 🙂

Oh.. one cool thing I found waiting for us were these pictures from freind Jena’s Mother’s friends who’d just visited Antarctica.. They put a SamStone on Shackleton’s grave in South Georgia Island

Here’s where South Georgia Island is.

OK.. now to sleep !
Love you guys.. Love you Sam
-me

The day began with an unusual chill Diane came into our room and told me that it was 24 degrees below zero outside. I immediately felt like I was freezing. i bundled myself up.. came down stairs and hovered by the wood stove. I looked at the temperature and (thought I saw) that it was indeed 24 below.. actually as low as 26 below as I watched. I bundled up to go and get the paper.. that’s when I realized something was wrong.. it wasn’t all that cold out at all. I came back in and puzzled about it for awhile. It wasn’t until i was in the shower that I realized we’d both missed the decimal point after staring at the thermometer all morning. . Rather than being 24 blow, it was a relatively balmy 2.4 degrees below. I felt so funny.. and so grateful 2 below is pretty normal. 24 below can be a real hassle.

My first job today was a science show at Brewster Pierce Elementary in Huntington.. really one of my favorite schools in the state.

The show went really great.. I loved the kids and they loved the show. there’s always a hard part when I dedicate the show to Sam.. the kids seem to understand that I need to do that.

Afterwards Barbara, Chayna,  and Andrew helped me load the car.

My friend David also showed up at the show.. I didn’t know he was coming. David is deaf.. He and I have done a show before for deaf kids. David does the whole show in ASL. We have another show for the deaf coming up in Feb. Dave and I are going to spend some time before then experimenting om how to convert some of the sound oriented stuff into visual or kinesthetic excercizes.

I was late getting back to work from  Huntington and had to rejoin the quarterly Technical Vitality Council meeting already in progress. The meeting was great. I saw so many friends there that I hadn’t seen in many months. I’ve been working at home so much that I forgot how much I missed talking to some of these folks .

I worked at IBM until about 6:30 then unloaded my van from my equipment.. that’s where my little electric go-cart comes in so handy. Max and I built it many years ago.. it now serves as my tug… I use it to move my equipment from my storage closet to my car and visa versa. It’s so much fun to ride through the halls at work.

Jlleigh had called me to tell me that someone had found my bluetooth headset.. and that it was locked in her desk. She told me to pick the lock and get it. while I was in Williston. . so I did.

Unfortunately , id had been run over by a car.. so it no longer works.. 🙁

From there I went straight to ‘On the rise’ . Rand and Julie had invited me to go hear ‘The Firehouse District’ an eastern European / klezmer band. They were phenomenal..Even more so when I realized that none of these Yiddish singing, accordion playing folks were even Jewish !

I was so impressed with the show.It was great being out with Rand and Julie.. I ran into so many folks I knew. I’ve never been to a music show at On The Rise.. now I’m going to try and check them out whenever I can. They have a great calender of shows coming..

OK.. I gotta be up early tomorrow to go to Champlain College.. I better end here.. Gnite everyone.Gnite Sam.. I love you
-me

Jam packed day and boy am I beat. I gotta make this short so I can get soem sleep. I ony got about 4 hours sleep last night because I satyed up working/playing on the computer. I was not ready to wake up when Chai started pawing me at 6:15 AM..  I stayed in bed and meditated for about an hour then slithered downstairs. I took Gabe to school then came back and worked while Diane taught her Thursday morning Yoga. After Yoga, our friend Betsy came in for a nice visit. We talked about how kind and sensitive folks have been to our feelings around Kate and Brandon’s deaths. It was interesting trying explain how we felt.. So many folks are worried that these new tragedies will somehow open old wounds for us around Sam’s death. It’s true, we are deeply saddened by the loss of these great kids… Our sadness though is for the kids, their families and our community. Not for us. It’s not that the situation doesn’t remind us of our own loss..  everything reminds us of that loss. It’s that we know where we are now. We don’t need to be protected from others pain.. we want to be there for them as others were there for us. I hope that makes sense. Anyway.. it was a good conversation. Sometimes it really helps to try and put thoughts like that into ords.. it helps crystallize your thinking.

Speaking of crystallized.. I nearly crystallized when Diane and I took Chai fro a run. I was dressed for  about 10 degrees warmer than it was.  I nearly froze.. especially because we had to stop to play with Chai’s friends.

Interesting to see lots of new beaver activity out by the river . They recently dropped a huge tree across our running trail. Beavers are both industrious and impractical  That’s why they’re the MIT Mascott..  (“Beaver, beaver, build your damn, who’s the best school in the land ?“..  What were they thinking ?!

We dawdled a bit too long outside and got home at 10L48. I had a big meeting to drive at 11. In those 12 minutes, I managed to 1) move my science equipment from the station wagon to the van, 2) shower, 3) shave, 4) brush teeth,, 5)  (almost) get dressed and 6) eat something resembling breakfast. I say almost get dressed because half way through my meeting I realized that my shirt was on inside out..   I’m pretty hopeless.

I had an extremely focused and productive day after that. I spent a few hours at Champlain working with the students on our project. It all has got to be done in the next week and a half or so. I don’t know how that’s going to happen.. but it should be fun. I’m really loving working with those guys. BTW, Ann and her team were written up in a great article in Seven Days this week . Check it out. the piece had some great artwork by the students there . Including this on by Nick who will be interviewed for our project.

It was really fun hanging out with Gabe tonight.. we were pretty goofy.

OK.. where was I.. I had some stuff left over from yesterday that I didn’t want mixed in with the experience of Brandon’s service.

Oh yes.. yesterday evening turned out to be especially fun and relaxing. I had planned to meet friend Pete at Mexicali for a work meeting. We were both able to get there about an hour earlier than planned which meant more good talk.. after getting our work done. Pete’s been a really good friend to me over the past few years.. He’s the most non nerd like MIT nerd that I know.

Gabe had made a plan to go to Talent at 6.. so I went over there after Meicali and hung out with Diane, Hannah. Dave, Adah, Senyah and Hannah’s mom.  I just love that place. I can spend hours just reading the artwork on the skateboard decks. I particularly liked this one.. (sorry about the blur.. I was laughing !)

Here’s Diane and baby Senyah… who was named after Sam !

We went out and got some pizza from Marco’s (yum)  and brought it back to Talent and stayed there until about 9. We came back to a very lonely dog.. Chai was up in Sam’s room (though to be honest .. this picture is from last Sunday) . I know that she misses Sam very much too…

Matt and Ian had spent the night at our house.. so it was a busy (and sleepy) breakfast time.. just look at those eager faces.

I took Gabe in to school then took Chai out for a quick run. I had meetings all day.. so the only way to get a run was to take my meeting with me.. I hate to admit how many times I listen in to calls while I’m running or snow shoeing.. Is that horribly work life balance.. or really good work life balance.? Can’t decide.

I worked at home all day and was really motivated and efficient.. at least for me. I got a ton done..and listened in to a a very interesting day long call. Which gave me a chance to play with this lovely indoor Stonehenge.

Aside from a great Marci Reiki/massage session.. I was on the call and working from 8 until 5:45.   At that pint Diane and I went up to the mountain to watch the Night Rider’s contest.. We ran into Ralph on our way up the hill.

It was beautiful and chilly up there.. Some flakes of snow.. i think Gabe is somewhere in this picture.. but even if he isn’t I like the light on the snow.

Jen was trying o i=fidn ways to keep her nose warm.. very becoming.. no ?

We hung out and ate.. I had way too many french fries.. I implore all of you who read this to never let me eat french fries.. I feel so gross right now.. ughhhhhh  . Soon it was time or the awards… I love the scene down there.

Gabe got third tonight in his age category.. Not bad !

Here’ Dr. Tim from Ferrell’s Chiropractic glues Even D’s arm back on…   Look.. good as new !

One of the things I’m working so hard on is the Good Games project I’m  doing with the faculty and students over at Champlain. It  has been so amazing working with these students. They are so good at mapping concepts to working code.. and working art.. (can art be working art ? ) . Yesterday they turned me on to a funny song by John Coulton called ‘Code Monkey’… (which is the theme song for the  the very profane  and low budget online southpark clone..) A code monkey works long hours converting caffeine into software.. which is what I’ve been doing for 26 years.. and what these kids are aspiring to be.. and what, come to think of it.. we’re trying to convince more kids to become view this Good Games program.. Someone, please stop us before we hurt someone ! 

Check these version of the song

Ok.. gotta sleep..   more tomorrow. Gnite all you code monkey’s.. gnite Sam
-me