Wow, what a drought here… so lets talk about some karate!  The last few workouts have been pockmarked amid work and Church activities, but it has been some good training nonetheless.  The last few workouts have focused on sweeping.  Sensei Tarrant has worked with us on various approaches to the sweep including the fading outside […]

Continue reading...

We spent the weekend socializing with some of our gamer friends, including my friend Ed Healy.  He came to town to run one of his Gamerati Tour event stops and asked if he could stay with us for a few days.  He was a great houseguest and is a lot of fun to have around, […]

Continue reading...

Those of you that have been keeping up with me on social media may understand that while I have been relatively silent on the blogging front I have actually been quite busy.  Between work on my Dad’ ukulele project (almost done with the finishing!), the demands of parenting, and my day job are adding up […]

Continue reading...

In just the blink of an eye, a few weeks have lapsed since I have updated the ol’ blog here.  The good news is that my lack of long-form writing is due to a lot of real-life stuff going on.  There’s a lot of work stuff going on and a few less than great personal […]

Continue reading...

Lately, work has been stressful.  For this reason, I’m actively trying to learn how to switch off that mental light switch at the end of the day that allows me to lapse into relaxation and family time.  Today was a good example… it was a pretty busy day, with most of the morning spent catching […]

Continue reading...

Wow, it seems that my personal blogging has taken a back seat to actually doing things!  Since the last time I blogged: Had two great karate classes, each taught by a different sandan in our organization. Had a whirlwind summit at work, which was very intense but productive.  I was essentially the only engineering person […]

Continue reading...

I’ve had a strange variety of songs stuck in my head this week.  Since I have no other clever blog topics today that I feel like writing about, I will enumerate these songs so they might get lodged in your head instead of mine. “Life By The Drop” by Stevie Ray Vaughan (learning how to […]

Continue reading...

Tonight, the duty fell to me to teach class since Sensei Tarrant and Brian are both out on vacation.  The class started as just Paul and I, but shortly after three other Shodans arrived.  I decided to structure the class very simply: I would take them through our Shodan exam one set of combinations at […]

Continue reading...

Spit coating is the initial step to putting on a French Polish finish.  I started the process on my Dad’s ukulele today, after doing a test sample just to get the feel for how shellac goes on to an instrument.  For this process, I just used some folded over cheesecloth and a little elbow grease […]

Continue reading...

Here I am, sitting at the gate in Denver waiting to find out if I get one of the overflow seats on this flight to Peoria. This frustrates me, since I booked my flight two weeks ago. All the same, my ticket says confirmed and the lady at the baggageclaim told me that I have […]

Continue reading...