Likely the first time ever!

Mom and I went down to the Puyallup fair this weekend. It was a birthday trip to go see the comedy show of Jeff Foxworthy and Larry the Cable Guy. Both acts were pretty funny and we enjoyed ourselves.

The Puyallup fair has exhibits for darn near everything, If you have the chance to go,it's worth a sense of wonder to stroll the Hobby Hall.

Ok, I teased the topic of first time ever, so here is the real news. I usually buy a bag of fair scones when I go to the Puyallup. Nothing newsie about that, but look closely at the picture below.

Can you see it? Yes, ladies and gentlemen, I got from the official Fisher Fair scone people a bag with TWO Scones! ! ! !  Likely the first time, ever, on the earth, that this happened. My bakers dozen magically expanded to a bag of 14!  Cue the trumpets, this deserves a fanfare. Where is that Guiness guy when I need him?
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This next Sunday, I go back to L.A. for a two week trip to help Honeywell Aerospace inspect the various gadgets that they build or overhaul. Mom will come down for a couple days on one of our mini-vacations. I have tickets to see a comedy play written by Ken Levine, of MASH, Cheers, Frasier, and Mariner play by play fame. Should be fun.
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The proofs are in for the eclipse shirts, so I thought I'd give you a preview of what they are going to look like. Pretty nice I think!

Ok, that's it for now! (Imagine, 2 scones in one bag. . . . .)
Dad

We're going to Mars

I just read this article about NASA getting funding for more space missions and thought it was pretty cool so check out this article if that kinda thing interests you.

http://futurism.com/its-official-were-going-to-mars/

-Patrick

Game Day

Sunday I was fortunate to get a ticket to a Seahawks game. My brother Rick usually takes Becky, but she was bust and couldn't come, so I was Becky for a day.

I choose to take the Sounder train down to King Street from Everett. Mom dropped me off and I found the correct platform to wait. They have little cement markers in the walkway that in theory show where the doors will be. Not really, but that was the plan. The train was there, but down the way, and the vets told me that it will come up when it's time to board. It did about 15 minutes prior to leaving.
I've been on trains before so I knew for a route going to Seattle, that a window on the right would give me the best view. Well, the way the station is in Everett, is that the train goes North and loops around to go South, so I was on the hillside side of the car and facing backwards. Oh well.

Got to King Street station and I just followed the crowd up the stairs, over the bridge, down the stairs, and headed towards the stadiums. Patrick, Rick, Brad, Tami and her husband Scott were at Safeco Field. They have a pre-game deal there so that those food vendors can make a few bucks. Visited there for a spell, and headed back to Century Link Stadium.

Went through security and into the exhibition building. More people there, Up some stairs and over into the stadium proper. Brother Rick in his 'wisdom' lead us not to the ramps going up to the third level, but into this stairwell. My goodness, every turn I was looking for the end of the stairs, but it went on and on and on. Finally up at the top, and while Rick was signing up for a free soft drink, I was using the time to catch up on my oxygen debt.

Seats that the Rick, Becky, Scott and Tami have are above the North end zone, but give a pretty good view of the field. In the shade for all but the last 10 minutes or so. Pregame was a tribute to 9/11 with a field sized flag carried by a mix of all the armed forces. Jack Patera (1st Seahawks Coach) did the 12th man flag.

There were field goals,and missed field goals for 3/4's of the game. The Sea-Gals change outfits at half time. Who knew? There is a ritual, I found out, where every Seahawks score, you ate a red vine candy. Again, who knew?

The game was won by the good guys, and I got to experience the throngs of people aiming for that silly bridge that goes over the tracks. Took about 1/2 hour from getting out of the stadium to my train.

It was a good way meeting up with the boys, and seeing what a NFL game is like in person. Thanks to Rick for thinking of me!

And so it goes!

Dad

SETI

I'm reaching somewhat of a milestone in the next few days. I have been running the Berkley Open Infrastructure for Network Computing (BOINC) for over a decade. 12 years actually. During that time I have faithfully logged my daily progress as I helped number crunch radio telescope signals in the long time search for Extraterrestrial signals. In short, we have been looking for a cousin of E.T. So far, haven't found any.

So, I have an Excel sheet with about 3460 lines of daily records. I didn't log weekends, and sometimes I missed some logging days when traveling or on vacation. The work units went on, so I get caught up. I am considering retiring the effort, as I move towards passing the 10,000,000 mark in work units completed. I figure that I've done my part. I'll keep running until I pass the milestone, but then will gracefully shut down my search.

There are 4,004,760 users as of today. I am ahead of all but 28,601 of them. So I am ahead of  99.28582% of the world wide users. 

Not Bad!
Dad

A truncated review of recent books

Hello again,

While I had fallen temporarily behind on my reading goals this year, a string of overtime shifts has allotted me ample time to catch up. And now, I'm even ahead of schedule! That is right, knocking out several books in the past week now puts me in a place where I have only 12 more books to read* before New Years and I will have successfully completed reading 52 books in 52 weeks. Whew what a ride it has been so far.

This week was kicked off by reading Flowers for Algernon by Keyes. This book is narrated by a gentleman who is mentally delayed. His name is Charlie. He attempts to read and write but it is very basic and flawed. The first few chapters have spelling errors and lack of depth as he simply describes the content of events and not their meaning. However, he is given the chance to undergo a medical experiment that has been successfully accomplished in a mouse, named Algernon. Algernon became, in mouse-metrics, very intelligent. Can this medical procedure make Charlie smart? I give my Brad Stamp of Approval on this one. Give it a go, if you're so inclined.

Next, I started and finished Cannery Row by none other than Steinbeck, who is now my most read author this year, clocking in at 3 books. Cannery Row is a run down fishing town. It's inhabitants are deceptively profound. The story highlights a few different characters that had they not landed a run down, leaky, decrepit building would be considered homeless. If you like thievery, complex characters, unexpected plot lines and attempting to catch hundreds of frogs, I would recommend Cannery Row. It is a shorter and easily ingestible novel. I don't think I've read a Steinbeck novel yet that I don't enjoy.

I followed that up by reading Born Standing Up. This is an autobiography by Steve Martin. This homely, witty, down to earth and relatable story is about the meteoric rise of Steve Martin in the world of comedy. What started as him giving fill-in 5 minute magic shows evolved into a sensational act that pulled in as many as 45,000 tickets for a single show. What is unique about Martin, is that while he became unequaled in his stand-up comedy fame in 1978-1981, he suddenly, unexpectedly, and with finality walked away, never performing stand-up again. I can't imagine anyone reading this book and not coming away with profound respect for Steve Martin.

I am currently slogging my way through the entertaining and sophisticated yet complicated Infinite Jest by David Foster Wallace. A 1,079 page epic novel of neurotic and aesthete whimsy. I don't know if I would recommend it to the faint of heart or feint of time. Pick this one up at your own risk or if you really enjoy youth, competitive tennis.

Until next time y'all, until then.

-Bradley

* For the mathematically disinclined that slates me at having finished 40 out of 52 books so far =)