On the Lighter Side

Somebody posted this article on the FB the other day.  It explains various forms of government assuming you have two cows.  The final explanation about surrealism is the most amusing:  "You have two giraffes. The government makes you take harmonica lessons."

Sometimes that's almost like work.  A week or so ago my boss told me I would be on Project A for 40% of my time, and there would be an engineer from India assigned as well - maybe for 50% of his/her time.  I started doing some work on Friday and got to the point where I could use the help of the engineer from India, so to indicate this I e-mailed my boss and the boss in India and asked for the name of the engineer and exactly what percentage of his or her time he would be assigned.  The boss in India replied and said that I was assigned 100% to Project A, and his engineer from India was assigned 25%.  Huh?!?  Then my boss replied and said I was only assigned 40%.  So.......not sure what is going on, but it almost meets the surrealism criteria.

Thankfulness 2018: Week 10

I seem to be falling farther and farther behind on this thankfulness log.  Week 10......yeah.....that was the beginning of March - most of the week was spent in New Zealand on vacation.  Lots of things to be thankful for then.  And then the weekend at home after I returned from New Zealand - including a Saturday of robotics competition.

A few extra special things I was thankful for:

• Seeing awesome wildlife - New Zealand fur seals, kiwi birds, little blue penguins, and so much more.
• Awesome scenery (yes, still).  Lots of that in New Zealand.
• Meeting interesting people - including a couple hitchhikers and a couple that was in their 40's and already retired.  Thanks to the advice of Mr. Money Mustache.
• Fellowship in a foreign country
• People who are somebody's mother.  I used to have a co-worker that would say this whenever there was a lady doing something particularly nice and thoughtful for someone.  She would say, "You can tell she's somebody's mother."  I was thankful for some warm hospitality from "somebody's mother."
• Being home after two weeks away - that's a nice feeling to be home and sleep in your own bed.  Which made me think about some people who don't have a home of their own and how sometimes that would be hard.  But also how sometimes those people have the privilege to call lots of places "home".

And some pictures:

Scenery while kayaking in the Golden Bay / Abel Tasman park area.  We paddled through that little arch you can see.

A beach break while kayaking.

A gracious hostess (somebody's mother) and host.  One of the highlights of the trip.

The champagne pool at Wai-O-Tapu.  More beautiful scenery.

The fun of being silly.

A little blue penguin.

New Zealand fur seal.  More of the interesting wildlife.

Thankfulness 2018: Week 9

Things got busy after I returned from vacation, and now I've fallen terribly behind on the thankfulness log again.  Here's the log from Week 9, which was all spent vacationing in New Zealand.

Milford Sound and Mitre Peak - part of the breathtaking scenery.

Thankfulness highlights:

• Breathtaking views of nature
• A fun kayaking excursion
• Good hikes
• A close friendship that can survive some ups and downs and clearing of the air between us
• God's global family

All geared up for our Milford Sound kayaking excursion.  And an illustration of the friendship.

More awesome scenery - near Te Anau.

Part of the drive to Milford Sound with lots of scenery.

Having fun on a hike.  Yes, those are glaciers.

More from New Zealand on the next thankfulness log.

Thankfulness 2018: Week 8

Some work this week, and the start of a vacation to New Zealand!  Things I was thankful for:

• The camaraderie of a team
• My kindle
• An empty seat next to me on the plane
• A long, hot shower after two days of traveling.  Seriously, this is one of life's best pleasures.
• Learning interesting things about vineyards

And a few pictures:

Part of the team camaraderie - bagging the robot.

Learning about vineyards.  Each plant has a right and a left "arm", and each arm is pruned to have 5 shoots, and then each shoot is pruned to have 2 bunches, which results in about 20 bunches per plant.

In New Zealand near the home of the first commercial bungy jumping location.  Fun fact:  The people who "invented" bungy jumping got the idea from watching people from Vanuatu do something similar with vines.

Thankfulness 2018: Week 7

Again week 7 was another crazy week of chaos and uncertainty at work.  Some things for which I was thankful were:

• In love the Father veils the future
• Receiving a compliment on my work
• A quick greeting from a friend.  He stopped by my desk just to say "hi" and to tell me to keep encouraged.
• Waking with a hymn in my head
• A funny encounter at the grocery store
• The power of asking.  What was made obvious to me that week was the power of asking.  In our human relationships, there is power in asking for what we need or want.  Not in a whining way, but telling somebody what we need because other people aren't mind readers.  God is a mind reader, so we don't need to ask for things because he doesn't know.  But I think there are two things related to asking God that supply the power.  One is admitting to ourselves that we need something.  The second is humbling ourselves enough to ask for what we need.

Again, not a lot of pictures being taken this week.  But that will definitely change next week.

Focusing on something besides work - had a robotics practice event.  My team's robot is not the one in the picture.

Stopping to appreciate to sunset as I left work.

Thankfulness 2018: Week 6

I got kind of behind due to work being busy and taking a long vacation.  Week six happened in mid-February.  It was a chaotic week because of upheaval at work, but it had some highlights and things that I was thankful for.

• A strong reminder about what is important in life.  My cousin and his family had a house fire.  They got out of the house in time, but most of their possessions didn't.
• Doing yoga with my favorite instructor
• Making time to exercise
• Having a support network and having a long Friday evening conversation with a friend from work.

I only took one non-work-related photo that week, so here it is.

As I heard birds chirping while shoveling snow, I was reminded that spring is just around the corner!

Thankfulness 2018: Week 5

Week 5 was a wild ride.  There was a big round of lay-offs at work this week, which creates lots of turmoil and emotions.

• One thing the lay-offs did was help make me thankful for the care of others when they were interested to know if I still had a job, etc.  I think it also helps illustrate the capability of people to have compassion and show the real emotions of how much they like their co-workers.
• Someone gave me some leftovers for supper when my fridge was bare.
• One of my mentors gave me a very sincere compliment on my professional capabilities.  He also gave me some good advice and feedback.
• I went downtown Saturday evening and ate supper with one of my friends who was laid off.  We had a good conversation, we enjoyed the ice sculptures, and I ate some delicious bacon wrapped meatloaf on a bed of mashed potatoes.

It took multiple blocks of ice to make this one.  We estimated its weight at somewhere between 300 and 500 pounds.

Thankfulness 2018: Week 4

Thankfulness from the last week in January - it was definitely a busy week!  A few highlights were:

• Being at robotics, especially because it helps to remind me to celebrate small victories.
• Craziness at work dying down.  We had a testing failure right before production, so I spent the week figuring out a workable path on that.
• Having fun solving logic puzzles with friends.
• Having central heat at work.  I saw some pictures from China where they got a bunch of snow, and I was reminded how thankful I am that I don't have to wear my coat at work here in the U.S.
• Receiving compliments - it was my 15 year anniversary at work this month, and they have a webpage where people can comment and congratulate you.  Some people said some very nice things.

I have a few pictures to go along with the week.

Part of the excitement for the week was having the robot chassis for this year complete and driveable.  Still a lot of work to do since we have aspirations to do much more than drive.

I went with a couple friends to go see Art Garfunkel in concert.  He sang a few oldies but goodies like "Sound of Silence" and "Bridge Over Troubled Water."  Did you know he has walked across both the U.S. and Europe?

Our escape room team - we're all engineers, so we were all about those logic puzzles.  We had plenty of time to spare.

Part of the source of trouble at work.  A few millimeters of warp can cause trouble!

Interesting Video on Emotional Agility

I watched this Ted talk by Susan David today and found it interesting.  My favorite line from it is, "You have dead people goals."  The title of the Ted talk is "The gift and power of emotional courage."

I feel like what is said in the video is often what Uncle Bex and my massage therapist try to tell me.  During the times when I wish I was a robot without feelings, this is the reminder - that being a robot is like being a dead person.

Thankfulness 2018: Week 3

Top three thankfulness highlights from the third week of January were:

• The excitement of problem solving.  I think that day it was related to robotics, but it's possible it was related to work as well.  In fact, there were several items related to robotics this week.  Getting a circuit working, in general having fun, etc.
• Celebrating small victories.  That was the theme of one of my fellow robotics mentors that week.  It's always a good reminder for us engineer types because every day of every year at work involves making small victories but not always seeing the final product for months and years.  So you have to celebrate the small things to keep going to achieve the bigger things.  If you don't celebrate small victories, you end up down in a pit only being able to see the problems and you get discouraged.
• Exercising.  It was Week 2 of T-25 Beta.  I was thankful I have the physical capability to exercise, and thankful to have the self-discipline to be doing it.  And I also went to yoga on Saturday where one of my favorite yoga instructors was teaching.

The pictures I took this week didn't have a high variety, so here are a couple scenery pictures from the week.  The benefit of really cold weather is there are some beautiful, clear skies.

Thankfulness 2018: Week 2

A couple highlights from the Week 2 thankfulness list:

1. Seeing a gorgeous sunset.  In fact, I saw 2 or 3 of them this week and stopped to take a moment as I left work to stand on the steps and appreciate them.
2. Feeling excited for the upcoming weekend.  It's not that I haven't looked forward to some other travel and visits that happened in the last several months, but for the first time in a long time I was feeling truly excited about the upcoming weekend.  Maybe the cloud of feeling overworked is lifting slightly.  After all, I only worked 49.5 hours for the week.
3. A day full of laughter.  A couple friends that I saw this past weekend know how to tell a good, entertaining story. And I guess they have a similar enough sense of humor that I think lots of their jokes are funny. Overall my birthday was a great day full of friends and laughter.

One of the gorgeous sunsets.  That's the nice thing about temperatures near zero.

Good friends and a great weekend.

Thankfulness 2018: Week 1

Here's what I've decided to do for thankfulness in 2018.  I'm still keeping my daily log, but for the week I'll just highlight a couple special ones along with maybe a picture or two with a little more in-depth explanation instead of just a bullet-ed list.

Some special thanks from Week 1:

1. Watching a full moon rise.  This one was exceptional for some reason.  As it came above the horizon it was almost like a harvest moon on the first of January.  It was really big and an orange color.  The very cold temperatures probably helped it look extra clear.
2. Inspirational reading.  Not every single leadership book that I read is completely revolutionary, but I like to read one now and then for the spark of inspiration and the reminder that we can be better than we are right now.
3. A good conversation with my mentor at work.  He gives some good advice and also challenges me when needed.

From Stephen Covey's "The 8th Habit" on finding your voice.  I love my kindle for reading when I'm traveling because it's less space and weight in your backpack, but there's also something special about a real book that you can mark up and flip through randomly if you like.  This seemed like good advice as long as you also check in with God on what you plan to be doing.  Maybe that's part of #4 on those questions.

2017 Thankfulness: Week 52

I did it!  Fifty-two full weeks of logging my thankfulness.  Overall I would say it was a good project, and it's a habit that I plan to continue.  As I said one other time, I think it helped improve my attitude and helped me sleep better.  This year was a tough one, and I would say this habit helped me to endure.  There was the occasional day here and there where I forgot and had to do a make-up log the next day, but I think at least 95% of the time I actually did log the thankfulness at the end of each day.  Even on the days when you get to the end of the day and feel like nothing much good happened that day - that is was the same old boring routine, finding something to be thankful for helps to change that perspective.

I don't think I'll publish the log for the next year as I think that would start to get tedious for me and my reader.  Or should I say readers.  There might be 2 or 3 of you.  I think I'll do a weekly thankfulness post, but it won't be the same format and might be more simple so I can spend some of my blogging time writing about other stuff.

Here it is, the final thankfulness log of 2017.

Sunday

• Fellowship with extended family
• Playing board games with family
• Delicious potluck

Monday

• Loving family
• Time spent together with family
• Big homemade meal

Tuesday

• Getting some exercise
• A warm house in subzero temperatures
• Spending time with nieces and a nephew

Wednesday

• A nice talk with my mom
• People who make me laugh heartily
• Peace and quiet

Thursday

• Seeing extended family
• Playing an enjoyable board game
• Not throwing up

Friday

• Feeling partially in better health
• Interesting reading
• Family braving the elements and getting me tea while I sit in the car

Saturday

• Extra time with family
• Living for eternal things
• The feeling of crisp cold air freezing the inside of your nose (-20 F!).  There is something special about that unique feeling.

Sunday

• Beauty of the sunrise
• Seeing sundogs
• New Year's Eve spent with friends playing games

I think this could be described as "stark" beauty.  I know some of you think this scenery is boring, but it's beautiful to me.

Playing an old favorite board game.

If you played along with this exercise at home and made you own thankfulness list, I hope you found it as helpful as I did.

2017 Thankfulness: Week 51

Thankfulness from the week before Christmas:

Sunday

• A well-timed text from a friend
• A day at home without an agenda
• The privilege of prayer

Monday

• Birds chirping
• Sunshine and warmth
• Good reminders

Tuesday

• Feeling in better spirits
• Healthy eating
• Teamwork

Wednesday

• Beef brisket
• Good bible study despite the capter being difficult
• Cleaning service

Thursday

• Lunch not eaten at my desk
• Upcoming long break from work
• Days will start getting longer

Friday

• Time to read a book
• Splurging on supper (eating dessert)
• A cleaner desk at work

Saturday

• A quiet reading nook in the airport
• A meal voucher
• Arriving at Mom and Dad's house

Airport entertainment that helped pass the time during flight delays.

The airport was recently remodeled, and they now have these nice reading nooks.

Bathroom Behavior Observation #15

Well, it's not so much an observation on behavior.  But this post is about a bathroom.  Specifically the women's restroom in the lobby at work.  The general layout is like this:  Door.  Small "entry room" with a low bench in case you need to take a small rest.  Sink area.  One toilet stall that is good sized because it's handicap accessible.

The bathroom stall looks like this.  Because it's comforting to feel like you're outdoors when using the toilet.  And people who have physical disabilities enjoy having obstacles in the bathroom stall to deal with.

Probably there's a good explanation on why it's in there, but at the same time it's amusing.

2017 Thankfulness: Week 50

Below is the thankfulness from the past week.  Overall it was kind of a rough week, but it had some really good highlights too.

We got a fair amount of white stuff this week.

Sunday

• Hugs
• Sunday afternoon naps
• A clear message from gospel meeting

Monday

• Psalm 27:14
• Grocery stores
• Some work meetings getting moved

Tuesday

• Friends I trust
• An evening without conference calls with China
• Poems

Wednesday

• Keeping my calorie consumption under the RDA target
• No mishaps during winter driving
• Being in a better mood

Thursday

• Eating my favorite pizza
• A free meal
• Taking time out of a busy day for me

Friday

• Doing something to bring a smile to someone's face and brighten their day
• The power of music
• Some introvert recovery time

Saturday

• An evening of board games
• Brunch with a friend
• Bright sunshine after a week of clouds

This might give more clarity to the items on Friday.

2017 Thankfulness: Week 49

The thankfulness log from a couple weeks ago is below.  I got a bit behind because I had used all my fast internet data too early in the billing cycle.

A good reminder I saw at work.

Sunday

• Hymns
• Prayer
• Reading inspiring books

Monday

• Reminder to be a lifelong learner
• Chiropractor appointment
• Balmy weather in December

Tuesday

• Seeing the beauty of a large moon in a clear sky
• Song lyrics exactly matching my thoughts and feelings
• A friend bringing me lunch

Wednesday

• Finding edible leftovers I had forgotten I had in the fridge
• A hug from my mentor
• A pause from work to go to Bible study

Thursday

• Beautiful sunset
• E-mail from a friend
• Canned chicken

Friday

• Lunch outside of work
• Getting almost 8 hours of sleep
• Arriving at my destination before I fell asleep

Saturday

• A day spent with good friends
• A listening ear for an in depth conversation
• Delicious corned beef hash for breakfast

The aforementioned friends.  Me with Bex and KarmX.

2017 Thankfulness: Week 48

Thankfulness from the week after Thanksgiving.

A beautiful sunset with the flag as I left work one evening.

Sunday

• Beautiful sunset
• Fellowship during and after meeting
• Leftovers

Monday

• Interesting reading material
• Loud snoring on a conference call that made everybody laugh
• Taking time to notice people as they are

Tuesday

• A weight-in number moving in the right direction
• Recipe learned from Mom
• Making progress on projects

Wednesday

• Slightly less chaos at work
• Meat in the freezer
• A good Bible study

Thursday

• Inspiration and encouragement
• The power of freedom of choice
• Playing a tuned piano

Friday

• Eating supper with a friend
• It's finally Friday!
• Making documentation progress

Saturday

• Volunteering with gracious professionals
• Enjoying the excitement and idiosyncrasies of middle school kids
• Chilling out to some Willie Nelson

Part of the robotics competition that I helped judge.

Literature Lesson

A poem has been going through my mind the last couple days, so I thought I'd share it for your encouragement as well.  The internet mostly attributes this poem to Edgar A. Guest from 1921 under the title "Keep Going".  Edgar Guest was an American poet (originally from England) writing poetry in the first half of the 1900's.  However, it seems there is some debate on this poem particular poem as some attribute it to John Greenleaf Whittier.

"Keep Going"

When things go wrong, as they sometimes will,

When the road you're trudging seems all uphill,

When the funds are low and the debts are high,

And you want to smile, but you have to sigh,

When care is pressing you down a bit-

Rest if you must, but don't you quit.

Life is queer with its twists and turns,

As every one of us sometimes learns,

And many a fellow turns about

When he might have won had he stuck it out.

Don't give up though the pace seems slow -

You may succeed with another blow.

Often the goal is nearer than

It seems to a faint and faltering man;

Often the struggler has given up

Whe he might have captured the victor's cup;

And he learned too late when the night came down,

How close he was to the golden crown.

Success is failure turned inside out -

The silver tint in the clouds of doubt,

And you never can tell how close you are,

It might be near when it seems afar;

So stick to the fight when you're hardest hit -

It's when things seem worst that you must not quit.

2017 Thankfulness: Week 47

Hey, this week was made for this activity since it includes Thanksgiving day!

Thanksgiving week thankfulness:

Sunday

• Seeing the sunset after a mostly rainy weekend
• Purchasing capability of the internet
• Feeling like making conversation after meeting

Monday

• A short work week
• Warmer afternoon temperatures
• Clear sky

Tuesday

• Getting the end of year review done
• Mental break while exercising on the stair stepper
• Caring friends

Wednesday

• A visit from my parents
• A short work week
• Planning to get some home projects done

Thursday

• Help with reaking leaves
• Delicious food on the Thanksgiving table
• Parents who are good examples

Friday

• Mom's cooking
• Another productive project day
• A dad who helps with projects

Saturday

• New bath doors installed
• Having people over for supper
• Mom helping with the cooking

I think my Thanksgiving post covers the pictures for the week.