J.P.

Trek.

The media and associated merchandising outlets have been going crazy over the release of the latest installment of “Star Wars”. I believe this chapter is called “The Force Awakens” or something like that. Even though I love science fiction, I’ve never been a huge fan of the Star Wars universe. I’ve seen all the movies but I’ve never waited in line to see them on opening day nor have I ever been one to see all the recuts and re-edits and such. I’m just not that much of a Star Wars fan. Though, quick side note, my first date ever as with a girl named Karen Black. We saw “The Empire Strikes Back” together. I think I was 12.

Just in time for Star Wars, a teaser-trailer has been released for the next Star Trek movie, “Star Trek Beyond”. I’m a big fan of the Star Trek universe so I was quite excited to see the trailer of this next movie.

I hated it. I watched it several times and confirmed that I hated the trailer. Directed by “The Fast and The Furious” director Justin Lin, I saw motorcycles, over the top stunts and a lot of kickboxing/martial arts. Not really the Star Trek I fell in love with as a young kid.

Uninspired by the upcoming movie, I decided to go back to watching fan-made movies and episodes of Star Trek. For those not familiar, there are several series and movies taking place in the Star Trek universe made by fans of the show. Some of these productions include actors from commercial Star Trek ventures. Some are adaptations of scripts that were never made into full blown productions. These productions take place in many different eras of Star Trek, some boast a foundation of The Original Series, others are set in a future we haven’t seen yet. All of these are funded, created and produced by fans of Star Trek. And many of them are quite impressive.

Earlier this year, a movie entitled “Star Trek: Renegades” was released. It’s available on YouTube. A slick production, the visual quality of this movie is impressive, there are many cast members from other Star Trek and sci-if shows and, while the story is a little different than what one is used to from Star Trek, it still feels like it belongs in the Star Trek universe. Sure, there was some wooden acting (remember many of the actors are fans of the show) and a plot hole here and there, but for the most part I was very impressed with the production of “Star Trek: Renegades”. I look forward to watching it again on a bigger screen (I watched it on my iPad for my first viewing) and I’m really hoping to see further episodes along this series’ timeline.

Here’s the trailer for “Star Trek: Renegades”. Astute observers will note that the lead female role is played by the same actress that played Xena’s daughter Livia/Eve in the latter part of that series. I am looking forward to being a supporter and backer of this and other Star Trek fan derived adventures.

And I have a goal of wearing a red shirt on screen someday. I might yet see the realization of my imaging of what I think a transporter beam should look like ¹.

¹ In 1987 I sent a storyboard, letter and documentation to Paramount in hopes of suggesting what the transporter should look like in “Star Trek V: The Final Frontier”. I received a favorable response from the company, however, my suggestion never made it to the movie. A version of it, though most likely pure coincidence and not quite identical to what I suggested, made it to “Star Trek: Voyager”.

17 December 2015 by J.P. Fun and Games Dept 0

Morning Routines.

In my never ending quest to basically Supe Myself Up and to live my life as best and productively as I can, I have been reading about the importance of a consistent morning routine. Now, there are some that say you have to wake up long before the crack of dawn to be productive, working your schedule so that lunch is in the latter half of your day, while others have a little more respect for one’s natural rhythms and give tips to work with that approach. Almost all of the articles that I have read (asianefficiency.com is one of them) have suggested that a consistent morning routine with certain key elements will give you that extra boost to make every day a great day.

I decided to start this approach this morning.

I started with a new approach to my alarm clock. Using an app called Sleep Cycle, I told my phone that I wanted to wake somewhere between 6:00 and 6:30 this morning. The app monitored my sleep all night and figured out at what time I would be the furthest away from deep sleep between 6:00 and 6:30 and sounded the alarm at the appropriate time. Humans tend to sleep in 90 minute cycles, and waking up when we’re in the midst of deep sleep is why we are sometimes groggy, so waking when you are in a lighter sleep is a key step in start the day right.

Upon awaking I immediately went the bathroom and then drank a glass of water. I never knew this, but drinking a glass of water upon waking helps wake your body up and gets things moving again. I felt better after the glass of water so I can see the logic in this.

Before going for my 45 minute morning walk (since the weather is a little wonky for bike rides at this time of year), I used an app called Headspace to do a 10 minute meditation. This helped me feel more grounded than I expected it to. During a recent physical my doctor suggested that I meditate more to help lower my blood pressure. I’m hoping that meditating will help calm my mind a little bit. I have a lot of stuff going on in my head at any given time.

I then proceeded with my morning walk and my usual morning routine of making the bed, showering, shaving, etc. Overall I felt like the day is off to a great start and I’m feeling pretty good for a Monday.

I was going to hold off on trying these changes in my routine and start a fresh with the New Year, but as they say, there’s no time like the present, so I’m going to try this approach and see how it works out in the long run. I know that these changes can’t hurt (even though some folks think that meditation lets the demons in, whatever that means) so it’s all for the best.

I can never stop learning.

14 December 2015 by J.P. Fun and Games Dept 0

Early Geek.

Data Terminal Systems Model 440 cash register

Last night I dreamed about working in a grocery store. In my dream I was my current age, with all the knowledge and such (the such including my Dad-bod) associated with being a middle-aged man but I was working in the Acme grocery store in my hometown. The Acme went out of business in the early 1980s but the building was quickly used as a Super Duper and later a “Big M”. The later incarnations were locally owned supermarkets.

I never worked for any grocery store in my life, though my sister worked at the “Big M” when she was a senior in high school, so I don’t know why I was dreaming about this experience but nonetheless there I was, stocking shelves, pricing items and running the cash register. I was happy, I had few cares and life felt good. Perhaps this was a way for my brain to destress. Maybe I was dreaming about grocery shopping for holiday meals.

The geek in me vividly remembers the part of the dream of me working the cash register; there was no scanning or anything but the cash register was electronic. Upon waking I could still hear the very familiar sound of the printer and I remembered how the cash register worked, since I studied these things as a young lad. I’ve mentioned before that my interest in electronic calculators and cash registers led me into my very strong interest and associated career in computer related fields. The cash register was a Data Terminal Systems Model 440, a very popular cash register found in many, many stores and other retail outlets in the mid 1970s to early 1990s. When I worked for ARC in the early 1990s, the nearby Great American grocery store still used these cash registers, but the dream definitely didn’t take place at Great American. I was definitely at the Acme.

Even though one can find just about anything on the Internet, I can’t find much in the way of Data Terminal Systems, a company that was based in Maynard, Massachusetts. This is kind of odd to me because their systems were everywhere in the 70s and 80s but one doesn’t even find systems on eBay or anything. There must be landfills loaded with these things and that’s a shame. I know that DTS was eventually sold off to National Semiconductor. I did some very brief contractor work for National Semiconductor in 1990 before moving on to my next challenge in life.

I still can’t figure out the purpose of the dream other than apparently enjoying a simpler existence, but the geek in me has enjoyed musing about the DTS cash register system this morning.

I guess I’m first and foremost a geek.

Roundabouts.

Photo courtesy of NYSDOT

Last night Earl and I were driving through town when we came to a roundabout. Because I was entering the roundabout, I yielded at the YIELD sign and looked to my left to see if there was traffic coming.

It was then that I observed a woman driving a beat up minivan entering the roundabout at the next leg to my left. She ignored all signs, all traffic in the roundabout, stepped on the gas and drove through the intersection as quickly as possible. Unfortunately, her behavior is quite common.

Many people in this area see roundabouts as scary, dangerous, incomprehensible and most importantly, un-American since they have lots of them in Europe. Because of their ties to socialism, folks ignore all traffic signs and just barrel through the roundabouts as quickly as possible, paying no heed to what’s happening with traffic at the moment. Perhaps it’s that sense of American Entitlement that gives folks “permission” to do what the hell they want at intersections with a roundabout.

As an almost Civil Engineer, I can tell you that roundabouts are safer for pedestrians and cyclists, safer for motorists (when the roundabout is used properly), safer for homes and businesses around a roundabout and better for the environment. Roundabouts keep traffic moving slowly. That’s what they’re designed to do: slow you down and allow you to navigate the intersection without having to stop (unless there’s a pedestrian crossing or conflicting traffic).

They’re brilliant!

So let’s review how a roundabout works:

1. In the United States, roundabout traffic travels counterclockwise. So, if you want to turn left at the intersection, you go around 270 degrees and exit right to make your left hand turn.

2. Traffic inside the roundabout always has the right of way. There’s no “hierarchy” of streets. No vehicle is more important than another. It doesn’t matter how much you paid for your vehicle, how big your vehicle is or how big your balls are, if you are entering the roundabout, you yield to traffic already in the roundabout (approaching from your left). Bicycles are included as a vehicle.

3. Bicycles should not be using the crosswalks or the sidewalks at a roundabout. Bicycles should travel just like any other vehicle in a roundabout. Since roundabout design speeds are around 15 MPH, a bicycle should be able to flow just like other traffic in the roundabout. And here’s a quick pro tip: bicycles should never be using sidewalks or crosswalks to begin with. Bicycles are vehicles and should be on the same side of the road as other vehicles and cyclists should be using hand signals to indicate their intentions.

4. When you are exiting a roundabout, use your turn signal to indicate that you’re turning out of the roundabout. This let’s those yielding to you know what you are doing.

5. Roundabouts are not the same as the big traffic circles and rotaries built in the 50s and 60s. They were designed for higher speed traffic. Today’s modern roundabouts are well marked and designed for speed limits around 15 MPH. You shouldn’t whip around one as quickly as possible.

Roundabouts are not hard to navigate if you have common sense. Unfortunately, common sense is a rarity these days and some motorists can’t think on their own. Bring along your common sense and everything will be fine.

12 December 2015 by J.P. Geek Ponderings and Musings 0

Spirit.

I’m sitting here in the park along the canal near the house. It is 60ºF, the sun is shining beautifully. Aside from the limited amount of sunlight this year, today could easily be mistaken for any given day in March in this area, just with a little bit less amount of mud from snow melt.

This doesn’t really get one in the holiday spirit.

The forecasters have been saying for months that we would have a mild winter this year due to the largest El Niño in known history. So far they have been correct. A quick look at the next 10 days has more of the same temperatures and weather during that time.

If the clouds cooperate I plan on going for a night flight tonight.

I spent the first half of the week working Greenville, S.C., and it struck me that not everyone is dependent on snow to get into the holiday spirit. It’s never really dawned on me that snowflakes and over the hills and through the woods and all that is a northern thing. Jingle Bells must sound ridiculous in the desert.

It gives me a whole new perspective on the holiday season. New perspectives at my age are good.

10 December 2015 by J.P. Ponderings and Musings 0

DL 1895.

I’m aboard Delta flight 1895 from Philadelphia to Atlanta, headed to Greenville for a short work trip. I’m on an MD90 in seat 3D. I’ll leave it to your imagination as to what part of the cabin I’m sitting in.

Earl and I were in the area visiting family for the holidays, so it was simple for him to just drop me off at the airport. A bonus of this arrangement is that I will see his smiling face at Syracuse when I get home mid-week. Plus we save on parking fees.

This flight is absolutely wonderful, the sky is clear and the air is smooth. I’m guessing we are in the high 20s as far as flight levels go. I could check but I’m just relaxing this flight. I did a bunch of work and made some great accomplishments before boarding earlier today; I’m going into the work week feeling good.

The visit with family was enjoyable but a little too short for my tastes. Time seems fleeting again, a sign that life is good. Sometimes it’s even better to grab a moment and savor it without electronic enhancement.

So I’ll end this entry with a snapshot of what I find to be beautiful.

6 December 2015 by J.P. Fun and Games Dept 0

Church.

This past weekend Earl and I attended the services in memory of my aunt and godmother after her 14 year battle with cancer. She was the daughter of an Episcopal priest and was still very active in the Episcopal church in my hometown. The minister was a younger woman who had a joyous smile with a voice and demeanor to match. I felt comfortable in this church and I enjoyed the services for what they were.

When it came time to recite The Lord’s Prayer during the service, I couldn’t help but smile as I spoke along with the congregation. I smiled because the I learned The Lord’s Prayer through the popular song by Sister Janet Mead in 1974. In my head I’m singing the tune while I speak the words along with the congregation.

There are worse things I could have learned in the early 1970s.

The idea of a church based pop tune reaching #4 on the Billboard charts today is nearly unthinkable. Perhaps I’m growing old, but I can’t help but think about how times have changed. I wonder where we’ll be 40 years from now.

https://youtu.be/j__6Eyt8uYM

2 December 2015 by J.P. Ponderings and Musings 0

Lights.

I refuse to acknowledge the existence of the Christmas Holiday season until after Thanksgiving has passed. I believe that as Americans we have a lot to be thankful for and that we should set aside time to think and reflect about how thankful we should be to be where we are today. So I’m big on making sure Thanksgiving gets its due.

On Friday we went to “Lights On The Lake” outside of Syracuse at Onondaga Lake Park. We have enjoyed “Lights On The Lake” for many years and this year was no different; Christmas music playing on the radio, holiday motifs and twinkling lights stirred up an excitement I haven’t felt for the holidays in a number of years.

I was so inspired that I put up all of our outdoor decorations on the house yesterday. I’m inspired to do more decorating outside, it’s just a matter of figuring out where to put the lights I have in the collection and how to get power to them. It’s amazing what one can do with these new LED lights; the directions on the box say you can hook up to 18 sets of 100 lights together. It was just a few years ago that you couldn’t hook up more than three sets of incandescent lights together without risking setting fire to something.

I have to admit that while I do love stringing lights all over the lawn and such, I have no interest in making them dance or blink in tune to music or compete in some sort of reality show called “Candelabra Showdown Sweepstakes” or something of that sort. Competitive holiday decorating is a symptom of everything that disappoints me about today’s modern society.

Despite enjoying modern technology and the ability to plug in 1,800 lights into one plug, I still like to keep it traditional.

29 November 2015 by J.P. Fun and Games Dept Ponderings and Musings 0

MacInHouse.

A couple of weeks ago, when Earl and I were at the Hollywood Casino in Tunica Resorts, Mississippi, I hit the jackpot on a slot machine. As I mentioned in that blog entry, I was quite happy about the whole ordeal and I instantly knew what I was going to do with my winnings.

I bought Earl a new computer. He’s been using the same MacBook Pro for a few years and it’s getting tired. It works but it’s slow. We’ve copied the data from previous computers over and over again to the point that his 2010 MacBook Pro still has settings for Sprint Dial-Up Internet service. This has made his fast computer very slow.

Talking it over, he decided that he’d like a desktop computer, since he doesn’t take his laptop with him anymore, he travels with his personal iPad. We went to the Apple Store and looked over the options and decided on a 21.5-inch iMac with Retina Display. It arrived today.

This thing is gorgeous.

One thing that we decided on was that we were not going to copy over the data from his old computer, but start from scratch. Apple still makes this quite easy; you sign in with your iCloud credentials and the stuff you have backed up to iCloud fills in the blanks on your new computer. It doesn’t carry over all the old sludge, just the pertinent information you need to get up and running: passwords, mail account information, web browser bookmarks, etc. In less than an hour Earl was up and running at full speed on his new computer.

Buying this computer was important to me. In 2002 I hit the jackpot on a slot machine at the local casino and promptly bought myself a computer, without even considering our financial needs at the time. Earl and I had a pretty good fight about it (it’s called the “That Time I Was A Dick in 2002 Incident”, not to be confused with “The Great American Incident of 1999” which involved flying potato chips) and that decision has haunted me every time I’ve walked into a casino for the past 13 years.

Earl would never buy himself a computer; he won’t admit that his laptop is hideously slow, but it is and I can see the frustration in his face when he’s using it. It meant a lot to him that we decided to buy this new computer together and he’s already enjoying it very much.

And now I’m ready for the next jackpot opportunity!

25 November 2015 by J.P. Fun and Games Dept 0

Fuck Cancer.

My mom called me yesterday morning to let me know that my aunt and godmother had passed over to the other side after falling asleep on Sunday evening. This was not unexpected as she had been living with cancer for the last couple of years. A breast cancer survivor of several years ago, cancer had returned to other parts of her body. An expectation doesn’t make the news any easier to process. I’ve been musing over some pleasant memories and smiling. It’s funny in that it’s odd for me and my usually rock-solid memory for these things, but I don’t know how old she was. I know she was older than my mom by at least four years but I don’t know the specifics. You would think that a godson would know that about his godmother. The services are this coming weekend.

Hence the reason for my tweet yesterday morning, “Fuck Cancer”.

Over the past six months or so it seems like a lot of people in my life are affected by cancer. Radiation, chemotherapy, it all seems like such a shitty way to live but that’s part of surviving cancer, I guess. In a similar situation I don’t know if I would make the decision to go through all that, I don’t know if I’m strong enough. I know that people that live with cancer don’t deserve to do go through all those treatments but they’re very strong people to do so. That takes a lot of courage. The tin foil hat guy in me briefly wonders if there is a better solution out there but it wouldn’t benefit the pharmaceutical et. al. companies as much as the treatments for cancer, so that’s what’s available in Western medicine. I leave those thoughts for fleeting moments because they shouldn’t be focused on. Celebrating the lives of those that live with and pass on from cancer should be the focus, so that’s where I focus my energy.

I just know that my godmother was a pretty nifty lady. She was fairly soft spoken, had a wonderful smile and such a positive energy about her. A heart of gold. She was a strong woman, even before the cancer. I’m going to miss her.

Fuck Cancer.

24 November 2015 by J.P. Why. 6

J.P.

Trek.

Morning Routines.

Early Geek.

Roundabouts.

Spirit.

DL 1895.

Church.

Lights.

MacInHouse.

Fuck Cancer.

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