The Wedding Dress

Fighting at the Wedding

Jennifer's wedding day was fast approaching. Nothing could dampen her excitement. Her mother had found the PERFECT dress to wear to the wedding and would be the best dressed mother-of-the-bride ever!

A week later, Jennifer was horrified to learn that her father's new young wife had bought the exact same dress as Jennifer's mom! Jennifer asked her father's new wife to exchange it, but she refused. "Absolutely not! I look like a million bucks in this dress, and I'm wearing it," she replied.

Jennifer told her mother who graciously said, "Never mind sweetheart. I'll get another dress. After all, it's your special day." A few days later, Jennifer and her mom went shopping and did find another gorgeous dress. When they stopped for lunch, Jennifer asked her mother, "Are you going to return the original dress? You really don't have another occasion where you could wear it." Her mom just smiled and replied, "Of course I do, dear.... I'm wearing it to the rehearsal dinner!"

PersonalLifeWheel using MindManager

This is a personal map I made using MindManager. Interestingly, it parallels the LifeWheel found on some WorkLifeBalance websites like the one below.

LifeWheel

This is a LifeWheel found on some work-life balance websites.

United Computing Systems CDC 3600 Console

The CDC 3600 console left had two rows of triplet binary keys to write in octal. United Computing Systems had four of these systems in the late - 1970's thru the 1980's. I worked there for 2 years between my sophomore and junior years in college. The cabinets behind the console had rows of ~3"x3" curcuit cards inserted. Around back the interwiring for the cards occurred. I was told that 4 cards equaled one AND gate. The floor beneath the operators feet was false with > 12" of space before the real floor. All the cables were run in there. I remember being on one side helping to move a cable and my coworker was standing in the false floor space talking to some one. I was impatient waiting (and bored on 3rd shift) so I crawled under the cabinet and grabbed his ankle hard. I scared him good, but it was dumb since you didn't know what kind of juice was running under there. Supposedly there was a guy on 2nd shift that kept beer 6 packs in the false floor and was always "maintaining" something in the back rows of cabinets, also having a cold one.

House building

The house we helped my brother Steven build shown later in the winter.

Book for my Daughter, Melissa

Everything we do is based on agreements we have made - agreements with ourselves, with other people, with God, with life. But the most important agreements are the ones we make with ourselves. In these agreements we tell ourselves who we are, how to behave, what is possible, what is impossible. One single agreement is not such a problem, but we have many agreements that come from fear, deplete our energy, and diminish our self-worth."

"In these agreements we tell ourselves who we are, how to behave, what is possible, what is impossible."

In this powerful book that has remained on The New York Times Bestseller List for over five years, don Miguel reveals the source of self-limiting beliefs that rob us of joy and create needless suffering. When we are ready to change these agreements, there are four deceptively simple, yet powerful agreements that we can adopt as guiding principles. The Four Agreements offer a powerful code of conduct that can rapidly transform our lives to a new experience of freedom, true happiness, and love.

The Four Agreements
1. Be Impeccable With Your Word
Speak with integrity. Say only what you mean. Avoid using the word to speak against yourself or to gossip about others. Use the power of your word in the direction of truth and love.

2. Don't Take Anything Personally
Nothing others do is because of you. What others say and do is a projection of their own reality, their own dream. When you are immune to the opinions and actions of others, you won't be the victim of needless suffering.

3. Don't Make Assumptions
Find the courage to ask questions and to express what you really want. Communicate with others as clearly as you can to avoid misunderstandings, sadness and drama. With just this one agreement, you can completely transform your life.

4. Always Do Your Best
Your best is going to change from moment to moment; it will be different when you are healthy as opposed to sick. Under any circumstance, simply do your best, and you will avoid self-judgment, self-abuse and regret.

from:4 Agreements

Last summer's house building vacation

My son, Christopher with my lover, Patricia. Patrick, my sister Lisa and Jimmy's son, is riding in the background one of the small bikes I brought up for fun. The road and direction he is on leads to the beach.

Low Temperature Superconductor Wire Cross Section

This is a cross section of low temperature superconducting wire. Note the 3 filaments at 10 o'clock departing from the general filament layout. These were intentionally placed as markers for wire identification. This wire was made in the mid - 1980's for the Superconducting Super Collider (SSC) project when I worked at IGC.

Niobium Titanium Low Temperature Superconductor Wire cross section

article for Christopher

http://www.boston.com/news/globe/health_science/articles/2005/06/14/advice_to_physicians_make_yourself_matter/

Five rules to make sure you do not disappear and that you do matter:
1. Ask an unscripted question.
2. Don't whine.
3. Count something.
4. Write something.
5. Change.