Man.. I’m beat.. I stayed up last night ’till 3L30 determined to get the lights for the time cylce workinng.. I’ was ready to give up around 11.. but I took a break, blogged.. and cleared my head… That gave me the clarity to jump back in and sort out the next layer of problems. My struggle was with eh poor quality of the components I’d ordered from China.. they were beautiful when they worked.. but every small moveent of the strips caused a few of the solder connections to the tiny chips to break. I ended up doing ‘bypass’ surgery on many of them.. I soldered jumpers around them.. But the tuime I went to bed near four.. all of it was working. I managed to sleep until 1L30 which was really wonderful…
   I woke rested.. but still had much to do before headign over to David D’s house to install the lights.. Once again I spent 80 percent of the day working on this @$# kighting porject and NOT hanging with my family, relaxing, exercising, etc..
I’m sad to have devoted so much time to fixing these lights.. Max is only here for another week.. I need to find time to hang with him and to go campong with Gabe..  I love my family so much.. why do I let myslef get so distracted from them sometimes ?

Anyway.. I worked on the light strips, lasers, power supplies and wiring harness until about 3.. It felt very good to make that last solder connection..  
 
I packed everythign up and headed down o bristol .. THere were about 6 folks there still working.. The Timecylce is really an amazing thing to see now.. 20 feet high , 3 tons (I’m guessing) / Homer and crew are still working like crazy to see if they can finish the vehicle before Wednesday when they have to leave. They still need to add the hydrolic motors !

I hadn’t seen the device for about a week since I’d been working on the lights with Seth here at our house. The progress was amazing. The thing looked exactly like the model homer had made.. and like the drawings he’d made. It’s so very amazing to see somethign this big and real jump from someones imagination into reallity.. I think that’s why we all make things.. It’s an existential thrill like no other. .. to make something appear from nothing !

While hthe mtors aren’t installed yet, were able to push the thing pretty easily. It’s amazingly easy to move by hand given its size.

Here’s the 40 Horsepower diesel engine that will run the hydrolic pump and the alternator

I spent the first few hours tie wrapping the plastic encapsulated led strips to some 5/16 inch rolled steel stock.. This will define the arc of the ligths and keep the strips form bending.   THey looked good as we worked !

At around 8 I couldn’t resist the urge to test mount the strips. David used the forklift to lift the wheel and allow me to rotate it so I could put n the light strips. The whole process took only 20 minute

The end effect was awesome.. Sorry this is only my phone’s camera.. it doan’t really cpature the impact of these lights..

Around 9 I started back home. I’m so happy to be nearing the end of the poroject.. It’s been fun.. but I need my life back.. I hope the the stuff remains robust for the next  couple of days .. We’ll just have to see…

Right now I just have to see my pillow.. More tomorrow’s folks.. thanks for dropping by.. Gnite all.. Gnite Sam !

-me

Hellow from beutiful Poughkeepsie New york (I just love writing Poughkeepsie.. Poughkeepsie, pouhgkeepsie.. who named this place.. ?)

I’m down here for a very fun (really) two day work meeting… .. The catch is.. the meeting started at 9ish this morning.. and I needed to stay in VT last night to watch the latest episode of The Colony. As is our new habit, we all crowded into Jen and Jim’s living room to watch one of the few Discovery channel receiving TV’s in our social circle. It’s getting to be quite a party each time.. I love it !..  It’s so much fun watching the show then filling in the folks with the stuff they missed (Cynthia.. giving nothing important away.. relax 🙂   I really liked ast nights episode.. it was really intense.. but I do have a couple of reservations.. First.. I’m kinda sad that the science builds are getting such a light treatment.. it’s generally just 1 or 2 shots then voila.. it works.. ! .. I would love to see more teaching involved.. about the science behind the builds.. I would gladly sacrifice some of the ‘drama’.. maruaders, yelling etc to do that.. That said, many folks.. including the women on the cast feel that we’re focusing too mcuh on the buuild. I guess if both of us are a little dissatisfied.. then maybe the show’s right where it should be 🙂 . I did learn that the ratings continue to rise.. 1.6 Million housholds.. making it the number two show on pay cable for men age 18 to 49 (!!!!).. Therein lies my second sadness .. The show seems to be catering mostly to males.. For some reason our women colonists are always protrayed as working in the kitchen, or laundry.. even though the were working on the  builds along side us  every day. Amy made the lift for  the water to the shower, the emergency ladder, the fish trap. Morgan worked with me on the gassifier and water filter.. she and I built a monster air cannon and a brick bread overn. she also made our first goat cheese.  and she helped me build the case for the solar tracker. Alison and I built a stethoscope.. and she helped me build a sphignometer (blood pressure thingy)..  I do know it’s hard to edit all the stuff that’s covered in a week. . and I really do feel that the production folks are doing a great job of balancing things. I just wish some more of this women-built stuff was making it into the show every week.  THE  COLONY WOMEN ROCK !

As soon as the show was over last night it was home to bed. I needed to wake early for my drive down to POK. I went to bed around 12:15 and woke up at 3:30 AM.. I quickly showered and headedd out the door. It was just after 4 when I ran into Max and Gabe coming in from juping on the tramp .. it was 4:08 AM.. It was fun gettign to hug them goodm moring/ good night before I headed out on the road.

The 5 and a hlaf our drive was very easy.. I talked to Morgan. Alison and George for nearly an hour.. they were still at a party at Allison’s house.. all.. uh.. a little.. tipsy shall I say.. OK>. really s**t faced if truth be told.. it was so much fun talking to them about the latest show.. I love those guys..

I spent the resto of the time on verious phone calls with Australia and India which made the time travel quickly. Before I knew it i was in POK in time for my meeting.
It was a great all day session. I wll say this.. being in a room with smart technical folks reminded me a gain that there is no substitute for a good face to face meeting.   We tend to forget that with all our dependence on teleconferences, web conferences, facebook, myspace, etc..

After the meeting we went out for a beer at a local saloon. I was goofing around turning the TV’s on and off ith my super TV-B-Gone when I got spotted by these guys.. Turns out that the middle person had attended one of my teacher talks in Poughkeepsie last month. All three were Colony watchers. It was great talking to them.. It is pretty odd these days, though. Everywhere I’m going folks want to ask about the show.. It’s fun and creepy at the same time.

OK.. I htink that’s it for tonight.. I nede to sleep. Good night everyone.. sleep well. Nite Sam !
-me