greetings from sherborn Mass. Diane, Gabe Max and I drove down this afternoon to suprise my dad for his 79th birthday. My mom was having a small party for him and we decided to show up just for fun. We got here about 6:30 just before the pother guests started to arrive. Dad was really happy and suprised to see us..   It was a really nice gathering of folks.. including my dad’s cosin Sam and his wife Martha. Sam’s a physicist at harvard doing research  in magnetic resonance imaging… he immedialtly started talking to me abotu his research which was very cool. My folks are both doing well… my mom made gumbo loaded full of okra.. THat’s always been one of my dad’s favorite dishes. He grew up in Lousiana… It was really nice being here for the party. I took a bunch of pictures.. but .. alas.. I forgot to bring any cables to pull them down. I’ll post them tomorrow. In fact.. I’ll do everything tomorrow. I can hardly keep my eyes open right now.. Talk to you all tomorrow. Happy birthday dad.. nite everyone.. nite Sam.. (there are tons of pictures of you here)

-me

Well.. this morning started out in an unusual way..Today I gave my self a late 50th bitrhday present and visited the local gastrointerologist for one of those uh… well.. invasive tests. I had ever square centimeter of my lower GI photographed by a freindly robotic camera.. Like 99 percent of eveyone who does this.. I was A-OK… and my lower GI is the picture of health. Let’s just say that the experience was interesting and memorable.. actually.. not that memorable since the drugs they give you make you forget everything that happened.  It’s something every healthy adult over 50 should do .. but many never do because.. well..  if you’ve been putting off getting a colonscopy. because t sounds painful and unpleasant…. I’m here to tell you it wasn’t bad.. . . in fact  it beat a day at work ! just do it. !
    Since I should spare you pictures of that part of my day.. I’ll show you what Diane and I have been working on all evening. We’ve just finished the light strips for one of the burning man TimeCycle vehicles giant wheels.. Here’s a movie of the strips going through a few pattern changes.. note the two strips combined are more than 60 feet long !  I think this is going to look way cool on the vehicle !

OMG>. i’s 1AM again.. gotta get to sleep.. More tomorrow.. Night everyone… night Sam !
-me

Did I really just say “I luv my veapon of doooooooom” on TV ? You guys.. I cannot even get close to describing how unutterably wierd it is to sit down with my family and friends and watch The Colony. I’m seeing it for the first time just like everyone else… The key difference is that I got to see all the stuff that isn’t on the show. All the cooking cleaning, writing, hanging out, arguing, goofing around… etc.. There was so much stuff that I can’t even imagine how hard it must have been to edit it down to an hour of TV each week. It’s really strange to see how people and situations are portrayed.. For example. it kinda seems like the women in the show aren’t getting as much face time as the guys. .. not sure why.. they awere all amazing. it’s quadruply wierd to see how you yourself are portrayed. I gotta say that I’m enjoying the ride.. though it can get bumpy at times. You need to have pretty thick skin to not let some of the more mean spirited blog and twitter comments get to you.. (eg.. one recent twitterer wrote : Colony Ep.1: pretty good until old, pale, naked computer engineer in the rain lol”).. On the other hand.. I’m really digging most of the feedback. it’s actually very good.
   Tonight’s show was fun for me because I remmeber this was the week I really started to figure out what I was doing on the show. It was strange for me… a pacifist..  to be making weapons (we made many more than they could show).. I can now say that the phrase ‘do not try this at home’ has appeared on the same screen as me.. I would have liked to have been able to explain the science behind the flame thrower .. actually a ‘propane accumulator’  a little more. It’s actually a very cool device I learned how to build at Burning Man..