News and Views

We have an Emergency Medical Technician in the family. Derek has been studying to become an EMT, and finally took the National Certification Test on Saturday. He passed, and yesterday received his certificate. The final step before he can actually work is to register with the state and get a license. It may take a […]

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We have had a Netflix account for several years, and generally like it a lot. I quit Blockbuster because I got so frustrated with late fees — I would be charged a whole new rental period for being one day late on a return. With Netflix, you can keep a movie as long as you […]

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We flew to Ottawa, Ontario yesterday. While passing through Security at Phoenix Airport, I had to put my brand new $1000 laptop in one tub, and my shoes, wallet, etc. in another. After passing through the X-Ray machine, I nested the shoe tub on top of the laptop tub and took them to a bench […]

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Gisele and I are spending next week in Ottawa, Canada. I’m presenting at the annual meeting of “The Society for the Preservation of Natural History Collections” in Ottawa, Canada, on some databasing software I’ve developed in collaboration with ASU. Should be a fun trip. The weather there looks nicer than here (about 75 degrees there […]

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Not me, but Gisele and Devon left last night for Taiwan. Devon will spend the summer there, studying Mandarin. Gisele will be there just 2 weeks. I was thinking of going too, but Derek is going through finals and Apollo is wearing a “cone of shame”, so I have too many responsibilities here.

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Here’s an interesting GoDaddy commercial. You may recognize one of the actors. Golddigger from Jet Pictures on Vimeo.

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Devon has decided to pursue graduate studies in Applied Physics at Cornell University, in Ithica, NY. Cornell is ranked 7th in the nation for Physics graduate programs (US News and World Report), so he could have done a lot worse. He had originally applied for the PHD program in Physics, but later regretted it, feeling […]

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Apollo had a seizure again last night, the first one since October. The vet said that unless they happen more than once a month, nothing needs to be done. I caught much of it on video and was going to post it here, but both Derek and Gisele were disturbed by the idea, so I […]

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Devon is in Rochester, NY this weekend where he was invited by the Rochester University Institute of Optics. This is one of the universities he applied to for Graduate Study. They accepted him, and he’s there now to review their offer. The Institute, funded partly by the US Department of Energy, has one of the […]

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This semester Derek has been training to be an EMT (Emergency Medical Technician). As part of his training he worked a shift in the Emergency Room at Banner Desert Hospital (used to be Desert Samaritan) in Mesa. It sounded very interesting, as he shadowed a certified EMT on his job, treating wounds, taking vitals, and […]

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