Kate,Steve, Shannon and Matt are  up  from

pittsburghvisiting us for a few days   I met Steve in a grocery store

right after we moved to pittsburg.. I was carrying max who was less

than 3 months old. I could tell steve had a baby too because he was

doing the put-the-baby-to-sleep side to side rock that dads do. Kate,

Matt and Steve became our good friends .. and helped keep us sane while

I was in grad school.   Max and Cody also drove up from NYC to see Kate and Steve..

After dinner, we all drove to Avery’s where we all gathered to watch the third episode

of The Colony. I think it’s pretty funny that we have to drive that far

(10 miles ?) to find someone who has both cable tv and cell phone

reception.  

There was a pretty big crowd of folks there to watch..

It was a hoot watching the show this with friends.. I liked this weeks episode.. I didn’t have much of a role this week.. I’m glad hat some other folks are getting more air time. i thought Joey was excellent in this episode. It’s kind of funny to seem him portrayed as such a  serious , down to business guy.. He can certainly be intense.. but he was one of the funniest of all of us.. he was always clowning around.     Mike was mike this episode.. Folks either love him or hate him.. “What’s Mike like” is usually the firrst question anyone asks me about the show.. It’s not an easy answer.. yes.. he’s just like that in person.. but he’s also a really nice guy inside.. and a wicked smart guy too. I don’t think I want to go into who things work out between us on the show.. or I’d be giving too much away.. just keep watching. Just like the other episodes..I hadn’t seen what the producers had chosen to include or exclude..   I was so glad that they managed to capture our trip out for oranges.. I’ll never forget climbing into that tree and smellign the oranges and orange blossoms. It was the first fresh food we’d eaten in  3 weeks… Even handling the fruit made us smell better !  I was so greatful to the tree that I thanked it before we left. Sometimes it’s also really interesting to see what they choose to drop.. For example.. we put in a ton of work breaking apart and adapting an old water heater to get the tank we used to make the solar heater.. .. there were also some other things.. none of which I should mention here.. because they may appear in later episodes.

Like the last two episodes, I followed the east coast airing of the show on Twitter.   and commenting on it myself. . in the course of the two hours I was watching there were about 254 comments abotu the show.. about 95 of them just mentioned the show with no opinion indicated.. … as in ‘watching the colony’..  of the balance.. 145 were positive comments, and 14 were negative.. I think that’s about 10 to 1 positive.. that’s pretty cool when you think of it..   That’s better than the ‘C-‘ that entertainment weekly gave us.. even as they recomended the show.. Jen had a copy of it there tonight..

I liked seeing the questions folks raised.. As in ‘ do they shut down the streets every time we went out’ (Yes) Did we ever have zombies (no.. but I often felt like one) .. Was mike an ******** (maybe. but I like him alot) .. Can they date Morgan (be my guest…) was I going to take another shower outside (what do you think ?!) . Did we eat the goats (I’ll never tell) ..    etc..   It’s very cool watching this stuff roll by.

I spoke with Joey. Mike and Amy after the show.. we all try to connect after each episode  to compare notes. I have to admit it’s kind of hard sometimes.. watching the show and hearing what folks said privately stirs up some strong emotions.. but hey.. that’s what reality TV is all about..

I think the episodes, the story and the builds only get builds only get better from here.. I’m really enjoying this show.. Hope you all are too…

You too Sam..
-me

I’m in route back to VT after a fun/short/interesting visit to Notre

Dame. It was very good catching up with my old friends there.   TOday I

did my best to attend the meeting in notre dame while also attending to

work. I did a fair ob.. but it’s hard to be in two places at once..  

You know, I’m getting increasingly convinced that our work culture is

doing the wrong thing in focusing so much on remote collaboration..It

certainly has it’s place on large projects.. but the level of

interaction is so much less interesting and less fulfilling.   I think

we need to divide our work such more tasks are geared around locally

autonomous face to face teams that would get together every so often to

collaborate remotely.. Call me a Luddite.. but I miss seeing people

when I tlak to them.. Nearly 0% of my work involves seeing people thse

days.. and seeing peopl eis one of the things I most love in life.. go

figure..
On a different note. I noticed this morning that today was

my 28th service anniversary at IBM.. 28 years ago I walked into building

973 wearing a light blue sweater with multiple holes in it.. I remember

that because I’d never lived anywhere that you might need a sweater in

august.   My most memorable thing about that day was that I got to set

off a fire extinguisher !…   28 years.. wow.. what A ride it’s been…

Speaking

of ride.. the plane is abotu to begin loading.. I better sign off

here.. It’s time to start getting nervous and excited  about the 3rd

installemnt of The Colony tomorrow.. Here’s  a short prelude of

tomorrow nights show

All for now.. Nite folks.. Night Sam !
-me

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlLhq-WzMag

Folks,
    Sitting in Ohare airport. Just realized I don’t have the right cable to download the pictures from today’s’ very cool assembly of wheel 2 for the time cycle. Instead, I’ll show you a quick experiment I did.. Here are two wordles’ (word frequency diagrams) from the last 9 days of twitter searched for ‘the colony discovery’.. Interesting to see..

Here’s the first

How cool is that.. Ooops we’re boarding. More later. Love you all ! Love you sam
-me