Wednesday night – integration

Incredibly busy day at work and out.. It’s really late (1:30 ish).. and I’m too tired to do it justice. So I’ll make this short.

I began the day really early because I needed to load my show equipment .. here I am in my storeroom down stairs.. quite a mess…

And I needed get to the welding store before 8:30   to get my liquid nitrogen dewer filled. I ran into my buddy Yolk there…  Yolk was the guy that hosted the iron pour back in  July. Turns out that he and Christine are getting married on Friday !!!  .. and our mutual friend Elijah will be up for the weeding. I hope I get to see him.

I then got to work and had a really insane day.. once again.. no work talk here.. but suffice it to say the day was rich with surprises and challenges. 

One bright spot, my good freind Jason came buy with a suprise for me.. he’d  consipred with a freind in Bonn to find me a 100 dinar note from Serbia with a picture of my hero Nikola Tesla . (there’s a one man show about Tesla this saturday at UVM .. thanks to the many folks who sent me notes about it !)

Over lunch I zoomed  to Gabes school to do a special show. The whole school had been doing standarized test (NECAP’s) for the whole week.. they needed a break.. I did abotu 45 minutes of electrical madness…

Then .. in the last 20 minutes we switched gears and made liquid nitrogen icecream.. for just about 400 students, faculty and staff. It was wonderfully chaotic and messy !

Man did we make a mess… It was a great time  but I had to get on a work call the moment the show was over.. so I had to pack and help celan up while talking with work folks.

A couple of hours later I went to south Burlignton.. to watch Gabe ‘s soccer team play .. Once again I had a (very good) work call.. but I was still able to watch.. ..

and take picture of the soccer mom and dad bumper stickers.

OK.. now .. second to last day on innovation journal..

1. What, if anything related to innovating occurred for you today?

Well.. I think my show with the ice cream was pretty innovative.. but my realy work began around 7 tonight at Homers.. we had our first integration meeting for the porject x monster.. . This was the first time the animatronics .. pnuematic body mechanics and head and hand artwork all came together for assembly. It was a lng hard night.. with lots of metal cutting, drilling, grinding to make things fit.. In the end it all came together… and I gotta say.. it’s really nice.

2. Who else was involved (knowingly or not!) in what happened for you on that effort today? (Please don’t forget to include ST chats, email exchanges, etc.)

On the sciene show, Diane and Gabe helped me plan the show, The CHMS principal.  Mark., helped me buy all the ice cream ingrediants.. a bunch of the teachers and staff helped me set up and Rogine handeld the very massive cleanup

On the Project-x thing tonight it was me, homer. Sara G. and seth.. 

3. In general, do you feel more optimistic or more concerned about the potential / likely success of this effort today than yesterday?  Why?

 I feel much more optimistic because I was able to see all the elements come together and work for the first time.

4. Please take a picture of something (anything) that is suggestive of this effort in any way that is meaningful to you….  (or draw one).

OK.. I have quite a few pictures.. here are the hands that Sara and Becca made.. they’re wood, PVC pipe and urethane foam.. pretty amazing !

.. and here’s the painted head…

We had to make soem major adjustments in the creatures reach to accomodate the longer and heavier hands.

Seth helped me on the mounh program.. We made a breakthrough by adding a sprign to counter balance gravity.. it made all the difference !

Fianlly we had all the elements combined, spooky head, talking mouth, flashing eyes, rising body and flailing arms.. and .. beleive me.. it’s pretty cool !!!!!

and quite scary.. this thing is big !

I’m particulalry proud of the voice tracking servos in the jaw.. we still have a bunch of fine tuning.. but it’s cool that we can make soemthign this big ‘talk’

..

And here’s the whole creature assembled..  Keep in mind.. he’s now about 17 feet tall when fully standing..   Let me know what you think !

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5. Did anything hinder your innovativeness today ?

my tough day job.. need for sleep..

6. Add anything else you think pertinent to your day.

Yes.. it’s over.. time to sleep. Nite all.. Nite Sam !

-me